my outline (subject to change)

here is the outline for my paper i have been working on. i have the feeling that this is going to be a much bigger project than i expected. if the outline makes any sense to you, please call me and explain it to me. cuz i'm pretty much lost.

also, i'd be kinda mad if somebody used this for a paper before i was able to finish it this week. that would seriously ruin my day. maybe i shouldn't make my ideas public.

• recent events cause others to try to define doctrine
• anti-mormonism
• ‘apostacy’
• media
• Olympics
• flds
• Romney
• attempts to define doctrine
• criteria
• millet
• lds.org
• oaks?
• interpretive
• oman
• problems
• criteriological
• millet and lds.org
• meets bare minimum
• circular
• oman
• assume the ‘brute facts’ and common doctrines
• definitional
• while each proposes to provide criteria for establishing or interpreting doctrine, they fail to define what this doctrine is
• assume it’s a given
• answers “what is doctrine?” but not “what doctrine is”
• fail to distinguish
• beliefs
• teachings
• policy
• doctrine
• harder issues
• truth
• time
• authority
• salvation
• specifics
• personal revelation
• morals of belief
• defining what is doctrine
• millet and lds.org
• lds.org “understanding mormon doctrine is . . . a matter of how [the abundant information available] is approached and examined.”
• criteria
• yes
• standard works, proclamations, declarations
• official publications / general conferences
• central/core
• contemporary has precedence over past
• consistent / sticking power
• are true
• no
• tangential
• lds.org “a single statement made by a single leader on a single occasion . . . is not meant to be officially binding for the whole church.”
• oman
• acknowledges some problems of determining doctrine
• Church doctrine “clearly function[s] as a theological authority, delineating those beliefs that have a claim . . . from those that do not.”
• jurisprudential analogy
• can provide boundaries of interpreting doctrine
• must begin with “easily identifiable core cases of Church Doctrine.”
• criteriological problems
• millet and lds.org
• millet and others place high valley for understanding correct doctrine
• important for salvation
• then method of determining doctrine must be of equal (or greater importance
• how can one be saved, if one cannot figure out what the saving doctrines are
• yet this specific criteria for establishing doctrine barely meets own criteria
• not in standard works, official declarations, proclamations
• never been espoused to be central or core
• only instance is in an anonymously authored newsroom report to media
• perhaps has been consistent over the past few years
• contemporary
• circularity
• even if it was justified by its criteria, it would suffer from circularity
• determining criteria is justified by the criteria itself
• analogous criteria
• 1
• criteria
• ‘if it is in the standard works or was taught in a sermon by brigham young, then it is scripture’
• justification for criteria
• brigham young (during a sermons) – “I have never yet preached a sermon and sent it out to the children of men, that they may not call scripture.”
• 2
• criteria
• church leaders will never teach anything that will lead saints astray
• justification for criteria
• wilford woodruff – “the Lord will never permit me or any other man who stands as president of this Church to lead you astray.”
• problem – criteria depends on its correctness to be correct
• oman
• in legal basis for analogy, the judge must appeal to “previously decided cases” of law
• what then are the “previously decided cases” of Church Doctrine?
• in law, a ‘previously decided case’ is easily understood as to what it is
• but ‘previously decided case’ of Church Doctrine does not seem so easily understood
• needs to be defined; who decides?
• by president (judge)?
• by people (jury)?
• scriptures (constitution)
• each of these still begs question on how authority to decide is determined and what the proper source for understanding that decision is
• back to millet’s criteria
• according to oman, need “easily identifiable core cases of,” “brute fact” of, or “clear instances of” Church Doctrine
• oman’s examples
• jesus is savior of mankind
• mormons shouldn’t drink coffee
• are these really that clear?
• what does it mean to say jesus is savior of mankind?
• dozens of theories about what it means
• even though mormons affirm it, many Christians say that they got it wrong
• simple statement isn’t so clear
• coffee?
• decaf? all caf? all warm beverages?
• same problem with ‘alcohol’
• all alcohol? just beverages? strong drinks and mild drinks?
• upon examination, these end up being vague concepts and categories, but hardly ‘clear instances’
• definitional problems
• propose ways to determine doctrine, but fail to define what it is that they are determining
• try to answer “what is doctrine?”
• ‘x is a doctrine’
• fail to answer “what is a doctrine?”
• ‘a doctrine is x’
• conflate and fail to distinguish beliefs, teachings, policy, and doctrine when they aren’t necessarily the same in ordinary usage
• problems result from this confusion
• beliefs
• millet paper titled “what do we really believe?”
• makes prescriptive claims about what he thinks we ought to believe
• fails and even discredits what many mormons actually believe
• ex. him discrediting the mormon who believed in a denial of the virgin birth
• ordinary usage – things that are believed by some, most, or almost all mormons, but may or may not be taught by the church
• examples
• jesus was married
• we should not drink caffeinated sodas
• younger earth creationism
• joseph translated our book of mormon using the urim and thummim
• beer is prohibited by the word of wisdom
• hard-pressed to find a specific belief that all mormons share
• true?
• very likely for a mormon to say “I believe x, but it may not be true.”
• teachings
• things that are taught, but not necessarily believed or considered doctrine
• oman page 6 points this out – not everything in scriptures, general conference, etc is Church Doctrine
• important distinction lacking in millet’s criteria
• example
• church-written institute manual for new testament includes kimball’s “peter, my brother” where Kimball teaches that apostle peter was instructed by Christ to deny him
• yet this is not considered doctrine
• compare to Sunday school manual with quote from Hinckley who portrays peter denial as a moment of weakness
• both of these are officially taught, yet cannot both be considered doctrine
• true?
• likely for a mormon to say “x is taught, but it might not be true.”
• policy
• mckay famously said that black priesthood ban “was a policy, not a doctrine.”
• may best be defined as procedural regulations that are contingent and not directly based in scripture or published revelations
• church handbook of instructions
• examples
• white clothing and complete submersion during baptism
• hair/clothing can’t float
• perfect recital of sacramental prayers
• modern word of wisdom
• particulars of temple rituals
• current abortion policy
• what distinguishes an official policy from an official teaching (or doctrine)?
• ex1
• ‘it is church policy that a person should be dressed in white for baptism’
• ‘the church teaches that a person should be dressed in white for baptism’
• ‘it is a doctrine that a person should be dressed in white for baptism’
• ex2
• (in 1950) ‘it is a church policy that men of African descent cannot be ordained in the priesthood’
• (in 1950) ‘the church teaches that men of African descent cannot be ordained in the priesthood’
• (in 1950) ‘it is a doctrine that men of African descent cannot be ordained in the priesthood’
• what about ‘it is a doctrine that in 1950 men of African descent could not be ordained in the priesthood’
• in first two instances, there seems to be no difference
• though in the third instance, the former seems problematic while the latter does not
• in the former, it seems to be mostly contingent
• in the latter there was constant appeal to divine mandate
• in the other formulation of the latter, the content is changed to a historical fact which does not seem problematic at all, not about policy anymore but historicity
• true?
• perhaps it is just a policy when one can say “x is a policy, but it is not necessary, and may not be right”
• doctrine
• like teachings and policy, must have an official stance
• mere belief by some does not make it doctrine
• that it is taught does not make it doctrine either
• ex. kimball’s “peter, my brother”
• truth
• quotes
• wirthlin: “to those who have strayed because of doctrinal concerns, we cannot apologize for the truth. we cannot deny doctrine given to us by the lord himself.”
• oaks: “a testimony of the gospel is a personal witness borne to our souls by the holy ghost that certain facts of eternal significance are true and that we know them to be true.”
• truth in itself is not sufficient
• oman
• example – salt lake city is the capital of utah
• true, but not church doctrine
• actual truth not sufficient
• belief that jesus was married
• teaching that peter was commanded to deny Christ
• though they may be believed or officially taught, there happenstance to also be true does not make it doctrine
• purported truth required
• “x is a church doctrine, but is false”
• “x is a church doctrine, but may be false”
• “x is a church doctrine, but may not be true”
• none of these make sense in ordinary mormon discourse
• doctrine must be purported to be true
• and must be believed to be true
• “x is a true doctrine, but it may not be true” is nonsensical
• doctrine as truth creates problems
• facing the harder issues – problem of truth
• millet, ‘facing the hard issues’
• there are harder issues that have largely been ignored by lds philosophers, theologians, and leaders
• problem of truth
• most mormons hold to a corresponding theory of truth
• “absolute truth”
• science is relative and faulty compared to truth Mormonism has
• recent gen conf examples
• uchtdorf oct 2006
• When we bear testimony, we declare the absolute truth of the gospel message. In a time when many perceive truth as relative, a declaration of absolute truth is not very popular, nor does it seem politically correct or opportune.
• nelson jan 1986
• “That background, drawn from my own personal experience, may serve to distinguish “relative” from “absolute” truth. In fact, early in my professional training, one instructor said that everything taught in medical school should have a sign posted on it: “This is our present understanding of the truth—until it is later shown to be false.” Of course, the truth isn’t “relative.” It is only man’s understanding of the truth that is “relative.””
• glen l pace oct 1987 (reprinted in mar 2002)
• “The members of many churches in the world have been putting pressure on their leaders to change doctrine to fit the changing lifestyle of the members. Many have been successful, and more and more we see churches made up of the doctrines of men. There are absolute truths of eternity. They do not change as a society drifts from them. No popular vote can change an absolute, eternal truth.”
• a proposition is true if it corresponds to reality/facts of the world
• the statement ‘salt lake city is the capital of utah’ is true if and only if salt lake city is actually the capital of utah
• problem of truth and changes over time
• if we take oman’s interpretive theory we must still appeal to the ‘brute facts of doctrine’
• those brute facts then would be known through millet’s criteria
• an aspect of millet’s criteria to avoid the ‘hard issues’ is contemporality
• consistently appeals to ‘today’ to determine doctrine
• teachings of past irrelevant
• “true doctrine has sticking power”
• if criteria is right, then at any time T, what passes for criteria is ‘true doctrine’
• ex. 1952 adam god
• taught by brigham young
• taught by his counselors
• published in church publications
• though many did not like it, it had some sticking power for a short time
• by criteria, it was a true doctrine in 1952
• however, by 2008 it was condemned by church leaders, was no longer published, and had certainly lost its sticking power
• by criteria, it is a false doctrine in 2008
• however the fact of the matter of whether or not adam was god the father has not changed
• compare to g. Washington being the first president.
• other examples
• young age of earth and the status of life on earth before fall
• immorality of birth control
• nature of god’s knowledge
• perpetuation of the practice of polygamy
• perpetuation of the priesthood ban (and theories of ban)
• many of these were not considered tangential, but were considered morally important and sometimes essential for salvation
• all of these were taught by church leaders, published, had sticking power, and were considered ‘true doctrines’ at one time, but are now false doctrines or at least non-doctrinal.
• with modern revelation any new revelation or teaching could falsify a previous teaching
• millet: “Time, experience, careful and ponderous thought, and subsequent revelation through prophets . . . [can] bring into question and eventually discount a particular idea. . . . Falsehood and error will eventually be detected and dismissed by those charged to guide the destiny of the kingdom of God.”
• then at any time (T1), any doctrine that is considered a true doctrine can at a later time (T2) be a false doctrine.
• what does it then mean for something to be a true doctrine?
• can absolute truth change?
• if so, then it is no more absolute then the relativism that is frequently criticized within mormonism
• moral problems
• perpetuation of polygamy
• in 1880 person A who believed/taught that (a) polygamy would no longer be practiced in a 20 years would have been espousing a false doctrine
• while in 1880 person B who maintained that (b) the church would always practice polygamy would have been espousing a true doctrine
• yet in 1900 we would see that (a) was a true belief and that (b) was actually a false doctrine
• if person A were too have continued to teach (a), then A could have been disciplined or considered apostate even though they were actually holding true belief
• yet person B would have been sustained for (b) even though it was a false belief
• similarly a person Y could be excommunicated today for a belief (y) which goes against current teachings, when theoretically in thirty years that belief could be validated by future revelation.
• ex. Janice alred
• so then a belief could be considered false because of current doctrine, but may be validated at another time; and likewise a belief could be validated under current doctrine, but may be falsified later on.
• so then, under any of the criteria, what is Church Doctrine may actually be false.
• then should any be pressured to abandon a particular belief or accept another if the former may actually be true or the latter may be false?
• facing the even harder issues
• millet: the hard issue is if B. Young was wrong about X and Y, then why should I trust him for Z.
• misses the harder issue: if Young was wrong about X and Y, then why should I trust T. Monson with A, B, and C?
• why should a latter-day saint follow a modern leader under the common rhetoric that ‘the lord will never allow the prophet to lead them astray’ when historically those called as prophets have been wrong at times
• millet: “Every member of the Church, including those called to guide its destiny, has the right to be wrong at one time or another or to say something that simply isn’t true.”
• oaks: “just as there is reasoning that is faulty, so also there is revelation that is spurious. . . . There are promptings from evil sources which are so carefully counterfeited as to deceive even the very elect.”
• what if Monson is wrong about something? How would we know?
• time to face the harder issues
• lds theologians, teachers, and leaders need to address the harder issues
• for a long time harder issues have been largely buried by obscure scholarship or have been readily dismissed as anti-mormon deception
• with new availability of information on the internet and a bigger and more developed discourse of this issues among internet communities and elsewhere, they can no longer be easily ignored or explained away.
• projects and questions for lds theologians, philosophers, teachers, and leaders
• is absolute truth still appropriate in discussing mormon beliefs
• are there other theories of truth that would better accommodate changing doctrine within Mormonism
• is modern revelation compatible with ‘absolute truth’
• should the church develop systematic creeds to define the faith
• without such creeds, should some members be excluded for departing from popular doctrines
• is church doctrine true?
• can salvation be tied to particular propositions if the practice does not change?
• does god sustain false doctrines?
• does the rhetoric of ‘true doctrines’ create more good or more harm to believers and non-believers?
•