Hamblin's Creed

[_Drifting]

When my daughter got married last summer, we were in the scary predicament of being behind on our tithing. We really were not sure if we were going to be able to catch up. We managed, but it wasn't easy. The price was whether or not we would be able to see our daughter sealed. There is just something not quite right about that, in my opinion.

I think there's a lot not right about it.
A. You have to pay ten percent of your income else miss your own daughters wedding.
B. Someone other than you and your daughter gets to decide if you can attend your daughters wedding or not.
C. If you decide to stump up the cash there is no guarentee that it will be spent on that which you donated it for and you do not get to see how it is spent. (unless you go shopping in SLC).

On the upside, you get to say you're a Mormon...

[_Equality]

Hamblin has "clarified" as follows:

Let me clarify a couple of things.

1- What I am describing is not a creed. It is an attempt to provide some coherent intellectual content to the term Mormon. Does claiming to be a Mormon imply certain beliefs or not?

2- If my four “beliefs” are unacceptable, can you come up with an alternative? Does the term Mormon imply actual belief in something? Or is the term intellectually meaningless. A Mormon can be a person who believes in God, or doesn’t believe in God. Who cares. Or a Mormon can accept Jesus as the Christ, or rejection Jesus as the Christ. It’s not important. So, if my four items are unacceptable to you, what would you put in their place? Nothing at all? Then the term Mormon becomes an incoherent nonsense word.

3- I’m not talking about church membership. Anyone who wants to attend church and retain their membership is perfectly fine with me. It’s none of my business. I’m talking about intellectual honesty and coherence.

4- I can’t for the life of me understand why someone who thinks Joseph Smith was liar or delusional (the two alternatives to being a true prophet) would possibly want to be a Mormon. It really makes absolutely no sense to me. It’s, quite frankly, nutty.

5- By your self-description, I would call you a theist. But that doesn’t make you a Mormon. There are lots of theists who are not Mormons. That’s fine. The description of you as a theist but not a Mormon makes coherent discussion possible. Your self-description as a Mormon, however, makes coherent discussion impossible.

The bolded part, to me, suggests that Hamblin is either not aware of what NOMs have been saying for the better part of the last decade at the New Order Mormon board, Mormon Stories, and liberal Mormon blogs, or he is simply not intellectually capable of understanding their reasons. Which do you think it is? Is he ignorant or stupid? There don't seem to be any other alternatives. Note how he doesn't say he disagrees with their rationales for continuing to identify as Mormon despite not believing literally in the Monsonite branch of Mormonism's core truth claims; rather, he says he can't understand those reasons.

[_Cicero]

Interesting . . .

If a minimum stated set of beliefs isn't a creed, then can one of the Religious Studies gurus on this board please enlighten me as to what a creed is?

Hamblin may be many things, but he is most assuredly neither ignorant nor stupid. What he is saying in 3 above, I think, is this: If a person does not accept the historicity of the Book of Mormon (see belief 3 in his OP), then that person must believe that Joseph Smith was either a fraud or delusional. In his mind, there is no alternative explanation. This actually does make some sense to me. If the Book of Mormon is not what it purports to be (i.e., a translation of an ancient record), then either Joseph Smith consciously created it OR he believed that he was in fact translating from a record only seen with "spiritual eyes," but what was in fact only in his head (in which case he was delusional). Either that, or God really does work in very mysterious ways indeed.

What Hamblin is missing is the whole issue of Mormonism as an emergent ethnicity (or, at least, as "a people"). I don't believe that the Book of Mormon is an actual record of people that really lived, and I do in fact struggle with remaining active in the Church. Perhaps I am a bit nutty, but what I do know is that even if I leave, I will still self-identify in at least some respect as a Mormon. What else am I going to call myself? I am not a WASP and I am way too far removed from my European ancestors to call myself anything else. I have no ethnic holidays or traditions to celebrate other than Mormon ones. So you tell me Bill, what should I call myself (other than "nutty")?

[Guest]

He can make up all the stupid lists he likes. He has no authority to enforce them. So let him bluster in the corner about his criteria for what makes a "real Mormon."

As far as I am aware, this is what makes a person a member of the LDS Church:

1. You were baptized.
2. You have not resigned.
3. You have not been excommunicated.

i've resigned, but i still feel free to call myself a "Mormon" -- it's part of my identity and i have as much right to the word as Hamblin does.

but this final sentence gets to the real purpose of Hamblin's post:

[...] most cultural Mormons [...] are therefore at least minimally equivocating when they call themselves Mormons.

it's not about creating a helpful taxonomy, it's about calling people he doesn't agree with liars.

[_palerobber]

Well, Drifting, I identify as a Mormon and I think that's between me and Joseph Smith.

I identify as Brad Pitt, doesn't mean I am though!

[...]

that's an amusing but poor analogy.

i'm an atheist and i've resigned, but i'm not just being facetious when i say i also identify as "Mormon." the formative Mormon experiences i had as a youth and young adult really happened. each of the generations of my Mormon heritage, by impacting the generation that followed, played an indirect role in shaping who i am. and traces of Mormon worldview and ethics can still be seen in some of my personal philosophies and instincts. no longer believing and no longer affiliating doesn't just wipe all of this away. i still own all this stuff.

none of the same can be said about you and Brad Pitt (as far as i know).

[_palerobber]

Hamblin has "clarified" as follows:

Let me clarify a couple of things.

1- What I am describing is not a creed. It is an attempt to provide some coherent intellectual content to the term Mormon. Does claiming to be a Mormon imply certain beliefs or not?

2- If my four “beliefs” are unacceptable, can you come up with an alternative? Does the term Mormon imply actual belief in something? Or is the term intellectually meaningless. A Mormon can be a person who believes in God, or doesn’t believe in God. Who cares. Or a Mormon can accept Jesus as the Christ, or rejection Jesus as the Christ. It’s not important. So, if my four items are unacceptable to you, what would you put in their place? Nothing at all? Then the term Mormon becomes an incoherent nonsense word.

3- I’m not talking about church membership. Anyone who wants to attend church and retain their membership is perfectly fine with me. It’s none of my business. I’m talking about intellectual honesty and coherence.

4- I can’t for the life of me understand why someone who thinks Joseph Smith was liar or delusional (the two alternatives to being a true prophet) would possibly want to be a Mormon. It really makes absolutely no sense to me. It’s, quite frankly, nutty.

5- By your self-description, I would call you a theist. But that doesn’t make you a Mormon. There are lots of theists who are not Mormons. That’s fine. The description of you as a theist but not a Mormon makes coherent discussion possible. Your self-description as a Mormon, however, makes coherent discussion impossible.

The bolded part, to me, suggests that Hamblin is either not aware of what NOMs have been saying for the better part of the last decade at the New Order Mormon board, Mormon Stories, and liberal Mormon blogs, or he is simply not intellectually capable of understanding their reasons. Which do you think it is? Is he ignorant or stupid? There don't seem to be any other alternatives. Note how he doesn't say he disagrees with their rationales for continuing to identify as Mormon despite not believing literally in the Monsonite branch of Mormonism's core truth claims; rather, he says he can't understand those reasons.

i think what he wrote there just stems from the deep underlying insecurity of believing Mormons -- they imagine that, if it turned out not to be true, they'd be so embarrassed and ashamed that they'd just have to distance themselves as far as possible from Mormonism.

[_Drifting]

I'm an atheist and i've resigned, but I'm not just being facetious when i say i also identify as "Mormon." the formative Mormon experiences i had as a youth and young adult really happened. each of the generations of my Mormon heritage, by impacting the generation that followed, played an indirect role in shaping who i am. and traces of Mormon worldview and ethics can still be seen in some of my personal philosophies and instincts. no longer believing and no longer affiliating doesn't just wipe all of this away. i still own all this stuff.

Well, perhaps a better (but less amusing) analogy maybe to suggest that's like a fifty year old still claiming to be an Eagle Scout even though he isn't involved in scouting and hasn't been for many many years.

[_malkie]

Hamblin has "clarified" as follows:

Let me clarify a couple of things.

1- What I am describing is not a creed. It is an attempt to provide some coherent intellectual content to the term Mormon. Does claiming to be a Mormon imply certain beliefs or not?

2- If my four “beliefs” are unacceptable, can you come up with an alternative? Does the term Mormon imply actual belief in something? Or is the term intellectually meaningless. A Mormon can be a person who believes in God, or doesn’t believe in God. Who cares. Or a Mormon can accept Jesus as the Christ, or rejection Jesus as the Christ. It’s not important. So, if my four items are unacceptable to you, what would you put in their place? Nothing at all? Then the term Mormon becomes an incoherent nonsense word.

3- I’m not talking about church membership. Anyone who wants to attend church and retain their membership is perfectly fine with me. It’s none of my business. I’m talking about intellectual honesty and coherence.

4- I can’t for the life of me understand why someone who thinks Joseph Smith was liar or delusional (the two alternatives to being a true prophet) would possibly want to be a Mormon. It really makes absolutely no sense to me. It’s, quite frankly, nutty.

5- By your self-description, I would call you a theist. But that doesn’t make you a Mormon. There are lots of theists who are not Mormons. That’s fine. The description of you as a theist but not a Mormon makes coherent discussion possible. Your self-description as a Mormon, however, makes coherent discussion impossible.

The bolded part, to me, suggests that Hamblin is either not aware of what NOMs have been saying for the better part of the last decade at the New Order Mormon board, Mormon Stories, and liberal Mormon blogs, or he is simply not intellectually capable of understanding their reasons. Which do you think it is? Is he ignorant or stupid? There don't seem to be any other alternatives. Note how he doesn't say he disagrees with their rationales for continuing to identify as Mormon despite not believing literally in the Monsonite branch of Mormonism's core truth claims; rather, he says he can't understand those reasons.

I think he has clarified even further that he recognises that he is using private definitions of words: Do words have meaning? (;=) Or perhaps that is just a random post completely unconnected with the present discussion - or he may have just seen Alice.

[_Equality]

I think the mistake in reasoning Hamblin makes is in considering as equivalent all individuals who do not believe in the foundational truth claims of Mormonism yet identify themselves as Mormon. Let me illustrate. Let's say "LeGrand" was raised in a Mormon family in Utah, a child of faithful, temple-married parents who both served missions and trace their family lines back to the Pioneers. Let's say LeGrand attended church regularly, was baptized at 8, a deacon at 12, served a mission, went to BYU, got married in the temple and started raising a family in the Mormon church. At, say, the age of 42 LeGrand undergoes a spiritual transformation by which he no longer believes in God or that the Book of Mormon is literally a historical account of ancient America, etc. Let's say LeGrand's wife and kids are still members of the church, and to help maintain family harmony, LeGrand attends church with them at least occasionally. But he resigned his membership and is no longer an "official" member. Nevertheless, he self-identifies as Mormon.

Now let's take "Rebecca." Rebecca was raised by Nevermo parents and converted to Mormonism as a teenager at the urging of one of her Mormon friends. She believed in the church's truth claims (and maybe she still does, deep down, believe), but after a time stopped going to church. She does not live behind the Zion Curtain, and has no other connection to the church than the fact that she remains on the membership rolls and every few months or years receives a visit from a home or visiting teacher given the assignment of tracking down the less active. If asked, she would acknowledge that she is a member of the church; she self-identifies as a Mormon.

Now let's take "Zeke." Zeke was baptized at age 8, believes the Book of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God, fervently believes that Joseph Smith was a true Prophet, believes in Jesus, His atonement, and literal resurrection. He also sustains Thomas S. Monson as Prophet, Seer, and Revelator. But he rarely goes to church. He does, however, receive visions and revelations. He sees images in cloud formations that he believes God has put there to communicate with him.

Finally, let's take Betty. She was never a member of the church, belongs to the Presbyterian church in which she was raised, has no family connection with the church, and lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan. She self-identifies as a Mormon.

Under Hamblin's rubric, LeGrand and Betty would not be legitimately called Mormons because neither believes in the things Hamblin has identified as essential to the term Mormon. Zeke and Rebecca, however, would seem to fit just fine under Hamblin's definition. I find it odd that Hamblin really can't "for the life of him" distinguish between LeGrand and Betty. He thinks it equally "nutty" for either to identify as Mormon. I do not. I think it might fairly be called nutty for Betty to call herself Mormon but have no trouble understanding why LeGrand would continue to identify as Mormon even after leaving the church.