Saint Socrates Society

Given where I teach, the question about the relationship between Mormonism and Christianity is something that comes up quite often in my classes and in general religious discussion.  For those interested in that discussion, this article may be of interest.  The author, Richard Mouw, is an evangelical who is very Mormon friendly.  Here he takes up a big sticking point – the LDS claim that man and God are members of the same species.  Perhaps the most famous expression of this LDS belief is the so-called ‘Lorenzo Snow couplet’, which says, “As man now is, God once was; As God is, man may be.”

I think there is no doubt, and Mouw seems to agree, that orthodox Christians simply cannot sign on to the view that human beings and God are members of the same species or that God the Father was, at one point, just as we are now.  A clear ontological difference between Creator and created is basic to orthodox Christianity and indeed orthodox Jewish teaching.  If Mormons believe the Snow couplet on its plain meaning, then Mormonism is a religion fundamentally distinct from the rest of the Christian world.

But Mouw proposes that the LDS church is actually backing away from the more controversial, heterodox (from the point of view of the rest of Christianity) part of the famous/infamous Lorenzo Snow couplet, that “as man is, God once was”.  If he is right, perhaps LDS theology is tracking toward a more conventional and orthodox set of beliefs that would be accepted as ‘Christian’ by the rest of Christianity.

I am frankly not informed enough on internal LDS theological debates and internal decisions about belief within the LDS hierarchy to have a view much worth sharing about where Mormonism is going.  I can, however, say this: in my experience with teaching thousands of LDS students over the last 12 years, my sense is that an overwhelming majority of my LDS students  believe what is contained in the Snow couplet.  Some if not most consider it a central belief (along with other related beliefs: that God is material, etc).  My LDS students who seem the most devout and informed have, in every case I can think of, deeply believed the doctrine contained in the Snow couplet and consider it fundamental to the Mormon faith.  In view of this, it seems odd for Gordon Hinckley to have said, regarding the claim that “God the Father was once a man”, that he was not sure if it was really taught (“I don’t know that we teach it, I don’t know that we emphasize it.”).  Given how widely held those beliefs are among my LDS students, it is hard to believe it is not taught or that it has not been a topic of discussion for some time.

And it is not hard to find echoes of the Snow couplet in popular and contemporary LDS works.  Terryl and Fiona Givens are widely respected scholars and very well regarded by all of the devout Mormons I know.  There are very clear shades of the Snow couplet in their book The God Who Weeps: How Mormonism Makes Sense of Life.  Indeed, that book dedicates most of a chapter to arguing that a wide range of orthodox Christian thinkers (they cite Tertullian, Augustine, Aquinas, Kierkegaard, and Weil) are wrong to think that God is metaphysically “other” than human beings.  Granted, the Givens are not part of the LDS hierarchy and so (a) their views are not authoritative for Mormons and (b) perhaps they have not received the internal memo suggesting that Mormons begin to de-emphasize the point.  But the book was published some 15 years after Gordon Hinckley’s remarks, so it is hard to imagine Mormons of the stature of the Givens would not have received the message.  All of that said, the main point here is that this example of a widely read book of popular LDS theology suggests that, for most of the Mormon world – including some of her intellectuals – the Snow Couplet is not being de-emphasized and re-interpreted.

So if LDS leadership is trying to genuinely back away from the first part of the Snow couplet and the claim that God and man are members of the same species, as well as reframing the second part of the couplet in terms of pretty ordinary Christian doctrines of theosis, then that shift in belief has not yet trickled down to the ordinary Mormon faithful.  And, if that is all so, it is understandable enough.  It takes time for shifts in belief to take hold across a culture.  Or perhaps Mouw’s interpretation of LDS theology and its trajectory is just wrong.

Hillary Clinton was on Meet the Press on Sunday, and a surprising amount of time was devoted to asking her about abortion (usually Republicans get those questions, not Democrats).  Clinton was making the point that her position is in line with Roe, women have a constitutional right to abortion but there are reasonable restrictions.  But the language she used in articulating this position was quite surprising.

When asked when the unborn have constitutional rights, Clinton responded: “The unborn person doesn’t have constitutional rights.  Now that doesn’t mean that we don’t do everything we possible can, in the vast majority of instances, you know, to help a mother who is carrying a child …”

An “unborn person”, “carrying a child”?  I imagine that Planned Parenthood and pro choice lobbies were less than pleased with Clinton screwing up the language that is customary for pro-choice talking points.  Pro-choicers are usually slavishly attached to impersonal jargon like “fetus”, “blastocyst”, “blog of tissue” or “clump of cells”.

This episode illuminates something interesting.  In talking about abortion in his encyclical letter Evangelium Vitae, Saint John Paul II remarked that we need to “call things by their proper name, without yielding to convenient compromises or to the temptation of self-deception.”  He was warning against referring to abortion as a “procedure” or an “interruption of pregnancy”, noting this sort of “linguistic phenomenon is itself a symptom of an uneasiness of conscience.”

Those who support abortion typically cannot speak about pregnancy in ordinary language.  When women (whether they are pro-choice or pro-life) have a desired pregnancy, they quite naturally refer to that which is in the womb as a “baby” or a “child” or a “person”.  They’ll ask things like, “When is your baby due?” or “What name will you give your child?”  Or the expectant mother will excitedly show pictures from the ultrasound, “Look at my baby!”  In every wanted pregnancy I have ever heard of, this is how mothers, fathers, aunts and uncles, siblings, and friends speak about the unborn.  Understandably, then, this is how Hillary herself spoke (calling things their proper name) during Chelsea’s first and now second pregnancy.  It is also quite common for expectant mothers to cultivate and feel an interpersonal bond with their unborn child.

But in case this is not obvious, let’s remind ourselves that the metaphysical and personal status of the unborn is not contingent on whether the pregnancy is wanted or unwanted.  We all know that what grows in the womb is not merely a “blob of tissue” or a “clump of cells”.  It has never made any sense to me how a pro-choice person can feel bonded to her unborn child, or talk about “the baby” in her womb when the pregnancy was desired but use entirely different terms when the pregnancy was unwanted.  Of course, it doesn’t make sense, given that it is completely unprincipled and incoherent.  And it is to deceive oneself so as to hide this incoherence that pro-choice folks cannot call things by their proper name, for if they do, the obvious moral horror of their pro-abortion position becomes clear.

This is what makes Hillary Clinton’s language on Meet the Press so interesting.  The mask came off, inadvertently I am sure, for just a moment on Sunday.  This is a dangerous slip-up for pro-choice folks, for they cannot afford to call things by their proper name.