Doctor Scratch wrote:Huh? I was talking more about his remark that Mormonism is both a religion and an ethnicity/identity. I.e., that it is a religion that became "a people."
I guess the pertinent question is: Is Mormonism defined principally by its beliefs, or by its people? The apologists are glad to remind us that the Church has no "systematic theology," so my inclination is to think that the latter is more correct.
I still feel a strong attachment to "Mormonism", yet I'm not a Mormon. Call me a "cultural" or "DNA Mormon", if you will, but I have no intention of "changing" the Church. I'm prepared to listen, to observe, and to try to understand the "TBMs". I don't want Mormonism to "change" to suit me, but perhaps to offer reasons why I should rethink my own position. I do acknowledge that once Mormonism becomes "cultural"; "socially acceptable";
au fait with "liberals" and The World Council of Churches,
et al, then it is no longer a "prophetic" religion, distancing itself from the "norms" of society. Prophets are "up-setters" who make all of us feel uncomfortable with our current "secular orthodoxies", and that is how it should be.