The American Spectator

p> MANY ARE CALLED br> Re: Paul Chesser’s It’s About Souls, Not Rolls : /p>

Take your defense of anti-Mormons and change the targets to Muslims or Jews. Your words would scream bigotry, and you and those you defend would be marked as hateful racists. And yes, Muslims do convert people. The only major difference is neither upholds Christ as the Son of God who was sacrificed for our sins, Mormons do.

It wasn’t that long ago that the ancestors of those you speak of were claiming the same rights of bigotry against a different type of fellow Christian. They claimed that as a right of conscience they could act bigoted against Catholics. Catholics, the people who actually solidified, set in stone, and promulgated around the world the very doctrine these “Christians” are defending. I guess bigots can have it both ways.

There is a fine line between protecting the souls of a congregation and protecting the revenue the preacher lives off of. You have come very close to noticing how badly that line gets crossed. If you had truly looked closer, you would have seen that lies and half truths and smears are used to promote bigotry, and the bigotry is what keeps the fold from listening, and keeps the fold from straying.

Since when has it become Christian to be bigoted? Can you find for me where Christ taught “blessed are the bigoted for they shall inherit heaven”? I keep forgetting about that commandment to love your neighbor as yourself, except of course for Mormons, hate them all you want. At least we have gotten past the point where all the Ten Commandments could be broken in the fight against Mormons. If we could just get past the part that says it is okay to lie against Mormons.

All this over a little difference. Mormons believe in God the Father, his Son Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost as a unified Godhead. Three distinct beings unified in purpose, the second two serving the first. When Christ was baptized or Stephen stoned, God hadn’t split Himself into two or three parts, nor was it an illusion. When Christ complained about God forsaking Him on the cross, it wasn’t some weirdness of God somehow forsaking Himself, but that Christ had truly been left to overcome sin and death on His own. No, this isn’t the doctrine as voted upon in the Counsel of Nicaea. It is good though to see that the old Creed is still serving its purpose to include those who profess it and exclude those who do not.

But please tell me. If this part of the Catholic Church is right, why isn’t the rest of it right? Or if the Catholic Church has strayed, would we all be required to return to it if it repents? Just who gets to decide which precepts and teachings we are allowed to Protest about in forming new Christian Churches, and which are forbidden taboos? If the Catholic Church once had authority straight from God, and has lost it, how would we ever get it back? Wouldn’t it be presumptuous for man to take it upon himself?

I will stop this line of logic. Follow it yourself if you aren’t afraid to convert. I would be happy just to find more Christians teaching each other to be more like Christ. But I will let you in on another little ugly secret. It is not just Mormons and Catholics upon whom this bigotry is focused. I once had a Baptist roommate who showed me a catalog where he could buy pamphlets attacking every other Christian religion. I still wonder if the company that produced this atrocity has other versions where they might erase say Church of Christ, enter Baptist in its place and sell it to even more people.

The competition for souls out there is fierce. Unfortunately some apparently believe that it is a no-holds barred, anything goes type of competition. They need to be reminded that behaving that way puts their souls in jeopardy.

p>Please stop supporting unconscionable “acts of conscience.”