Accentuating the positive
Posted by Dave Keller on April 12th, 2006
To prepare for this article I went and searched the LDS church website for “Catholic”, a word that brought up 294 hits. There was a good mix of articles. Some recounted Christian history and expressed gratitude for the Protestant Reformation and the counter reform that culminated in the Vatican II council. I found a few articles where Catholics were quoted because they had something favorable to say about some facet of Mormonism. It occurred to me that such citations manifest that Mormons crave respect from this long-standing branch of Christianity. How else can explain the acceptance of this much beloved quotation:
You Mormons are all ignoramuses. You don’t even know the strength of your own position. It is so strong that there is only one other tenable in the whole Christian world, and that is the position of the Catholic Church. The issue is between Catholicism and Mormonism. . . . The Protestants haven’t a leg to stand on.
A dozen or so conversion stories celebrated valuable additions to the Mormon church that came from a very moral and studious environment fostered by devotion to the Catholic faith. Gary Coleman, now a General Authority in the LDS church was one such. He had some thoughts of becoming a priest as a young man, but being introduced to the Book of Mormon brought a change of plans.
I know that conversion stories that don’t have an outcome we would wish are hard to read. I did notice the narratives focused on the positives of the new church and not discussing the short-comings of the old, except for a few comparisons. For example, some of the converts who were or had wished to be priests expressed gratitude for choosing to be married. Back in 1999, I ran across Steve Clifford’s conversion story from his debate with Barry Bickmore. It would seem that LDS publications don’t have a monopoly on this gentle way of expressing a personal change that has brought about peace.
I was specifically looking for a few positive quotes about Catholicism made by Joseph Smith. I didn’t find the ones I had in mind, but the thoughts below made the hit list. Of course, my selection of positive quotes does not mean that negative quotes can’t be dug up as well. However on this blog, I hope to be able to accentuate the positive.
The Prophet Joseph Smith said, “While one portion of the human race is judging and condemning the other without mercy, the Great Parent of the Universe looks upon the whole of the human family with a fatherly care and paternal regard; he views them as his offspring, and without any of those contracted feelings that influence the children of men. … He will judge them, ‘not according to what they have not, but according to what they have,’ those who have lived without law, will be judged without law, and those who have law, will be judged by that law … [by] their means of obtaining intelligence, the laws by which they are governed, the facilities afforded them of obtaining correct information, and His inscrutable designs in relation to the human family.†(Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 218.)
—-Gerald E. Jones, “Respect for Other People’s Beliefs,†Ensign, Oct. 1977, 69
A victim of intolerance, Joseph Smith was deeply offended when a Catholic convent was burned in New England, saying, “Yes, in sight of the very spot where the fire of American Independence was first kindled.†(History of the Church, 2:465.) Maligned, even today, Joseph once declared, “I am just as ready to die in defending the rights of a Presbyterian, a Baptist, or … any other denomination.†(History of the Church, 5:498.)
—-Neal A. Maxwell, “Joseph, the Seer,†Ensign, Nov. 1983, 54
April 21st, 2006 at 2:21 pm
Hello Dave, I found your site!!!
One of my favorite quotes from Joseph Smith is this one:
I also recall a Catholic priest who was friendly with the Saints in the early years of the church, but I cannot find anything on this now.
Anyway, I like your site.
Charity, TOm
April 21st, 2006 at 4:17 pm
TOm,
I am glad you have found your way here as I was about to go looking for you. I would love to get your input on ideas for this site.
Thanks for submitting this quote. I would like to compile more of these positive quotes regardless of whether the speaker/writer was Mormon or Catholic. So if you or anybody else runs across items that meet this criteria by all means dig up this thread and post it. I hope this thread and the comment section can act as a gathering place for such.
If I were to rewrite the original post I would probably also note Catholic and Mormon co-participation in humanitarian efforts. To me, no entity on earth can motivate charitable contributions to society than can organized religion. This is all the more reason to counter cynicism with a positive oriented site which fosters mutual respect.
April 21st, 2006 at 5:27 pm
Am I allowed to nitpick? I’ve always had a problem with this statement.
That doesn’t allow for the possibilities that the LDS church is a false restoration, or that it was a true restoration but then also apostatized.
April 21st, 2006 at 8:09 pm
>>Am I allowed to nitpick? I’ve always had a problem with this statement.
Your nitpicking is always welcome. While postiveness is what I rather idealistically envision for this site, I hope we will also be able to intelligently explore positions.
My first real life discussion of this quote with a Catholic also deflated its sense of importance. My correspondent indicated from a Catholic perspective, the Protestants might be regarded as having a stronger position than Mormons do because the baptisms of Protestants can be accepted whereas Mormons can not.
Protestants may have a leg to stand on, but it is leg very dependent on borrowed Catholic tradition. Mormonism may have in turn borrowed from Protestantism, but its position is strengthened by the angelic restoration of priesthood keys. When the question is which denomination has the most visible signs or most impressive foundational stories in regards to having authority, I think the strongest claims can be made by the LDS, the RCC, and the EOC.
>>That doesn’t allow for the possibilities that the LDS church is a false restoration.
Wouldn’t this be part of the Catholic position (hence allowed as a possibility)? As an idea that is independent of any affiliation, perhaps it deserves mention as a tenable position in its own right. Embracing the idea, though doesn’t help much in picking the strongest religious system to join up with.
>>that it was a true restoration but then also apostatized.
I think you have a point here about the possibilities of a tenable, strong position emerging from the re-restoration crowd. I don’t think that any of these were on the radar screen back when the quote first came out.
April 21st, 2006 at 9:24 pm
Err, yes, I was unclear in my first example. I meant that perhaps there really was an apostasy, but there has been no restoration at all, and the LDS church is a false claimant.
But I would agree that Protestants don’t have much of a leg to stand on.
May 4th, 2006 at 9:05 pm
Some more positive statements:
“I rejoice in the brotherhood of Mormons and Catholics.”
“This type of bridge-building opportunity should happen more often. We are not always going to agree on doctrine, but we need to find more common grounds to serve rather than battlegrounds to divide us.”
Dr. Fred Woods
Oct. 7, 2005
“There are sects who, while they do not profess the traditional Creed, still seek to follow Jesus. These groups like the Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses. They are part of the Church.â€
Fr. Richard Chilson
Full Christianity, p. 85
(thanks to TOm from D. Waltz for bringing this to my attention)
“I have found the Mormon people a gentle and kindly disposed people. I have never been insulted once. I have been obliged to visit places where there are no hotels and wherever I have stopped at private houses the people have always felt offended if I offered to pay them for the keep of myself and my horse.. . .”My mission here is not to make war among the Mormon people, or any other people, but rather to be the bearer of the message of peace and good will toward all men.”
Rev. Lawrence Scanlan
Early Utah and Nevada Bishop
cited in B.H. Roberts Defense of the Faith and the Saints, vol. 1 p. 113
“The old Catholic church traditions are worth more than all you have said. Here is a principle of logic that most men have no more sense than to adopt. I will illustrate it by an old apple tree. Here jumps off a branch and says, I am the true tree, and you are corrupt. If the whole tree is corrupt, are not its branches corrupt? If the Catholic religion is a false religion, how can any true religion come out of it? If the Catholic church is bad, how can any good thing come out of it? The character of the old churches have always been slandered by all apostates since the world began.
“I testify again, as the Lord lives, God never will acknowledge any traitors or apostates. Any man who will betray the Catholics will betray you; and if he will betray me, he will betray you.”
Pres. Joseph Smith
June 16, 1844 Discourse
“They asked me a thousand questions about the regions I had explored, and the valley which I have just described to you pleased them greatly from the account I gave them of it. Was that what determined them? I would not dare to assert it. They are there! In the last three years Utah has changed its aspect, and from a desert has become a flourishing territory, which will soon become one of the states of the Union.”
Father De Smet
on influencing Brigham Young to settle in the Salt Lake Valley
cited in The Catholic Church in Utah, pp. 270-1
“So far as the Catholic church is concerned, I believe that there is just as much truth, nay, personally I believe it has retained even more truth than other divisions of so-called Christendom; and there is just as much virtue, and I am sure there is more strength in the Roman Catholic church than there is in Protestant Christendom.”
B.H. Roberts
Conference Report, April 1906
“And then President Smith went on to tell them that this Church not only believes in tolerance, but also in understanding, and expressed the thought that long years ago Father Scanlan, a Roman Catholic Priest, conducted mass in the St. George tabernacle at the suggestion and with permission of one of the Council of the Twelve and the president of the stake, who were there.That happened on May 25, 1879. The priest had complained that he had no place in which he could conduct a mass for his people in southern Utah. The suggestion came from our brethren, and the mass was held. He had said, ‘We have no one to sing the Mass.’ The brethren had said, ‘You furnish the score; we will furnish the singers.’ And Catholic mass was conducted in a tabernacle.”
Elder Spencer W. Kimball
Conference Report, April 1951