This is spinning off from a thread about evangelical Christians over on GQ.
Are Mormons Protestant? Do they consider themselves Protestant?
I’m neither Protestant nor Mormon and may not understand the theological issues dividing non-Catholics, but my understanding is that Mormons hit some metrics of Protestantism and not others.
Pro:
—They use the King James Version of the Bible
—They are a product of the Second Great Awakening
—They are Christians who reject Papal authority
Anti:
—The Book of Mormon violates Revelations’ admonition to not consider new testaments/additions to scripture
—Radical re-interpretation of the Holy Trinity is at odds with mainline denominations
—No apostolic continuity (A deal-breaker in some, but not all, Protestant denominations)
—A rigid hierarchal church structure (big no-no in some, but not all, Protestant denominations)
I am leaning towards “No, they are not” but would like to see what other people think.
I may be out in left field, but I have always thought the church of LDS was a cult. I have known a few Mormons, and they talk like they are indoctrinated. They are also very secretive, in my experience.
As a Gentile who grew up in the land of Zion I would have agreed when I was younger, but the rise of evangelicals and to be honest a mainlining of beliefs by the church tempered that. (inside joke for other folks from that SLC area)
Without trying to insult anyone but to offer as objective as possible opinion here the writings of Smith seem pretty clearly rooted in the Methodist movement with some twists.
Full disclosure, being non-religious most denominations do appear to share some aspects of what people commonly consider cults, but in the US the Christian countercult movement from ~1940’s blurred the cult/sect differentiation (or seems to have) to the point where it is a derogatory term for someone different I personally shift that bar pretty high.
As an example Mormon funerals are way longer but once you get to the sales pitch at the end Baptist’s and some other Protestant funerals seem a bit more insane to me lately. But the themes seem to fit far better with Protestant than Catholic etc…
In my opinion, no. Protestantism arose with people like Luther and Calvin who felt that the Pope and the Catholic Church had wandered away from the original form of Christianity. They believe that they are going back to that original Christianity as it was created by Jesus and Paul. They felt they were restoring an old religion not founding a new one.
Latter Day Saints, to my understanding, do not follow this kind of doctrine. Their religion is based on a relatively recent divine revelation that was received in the 19th century. So they don’t feel they are going back to a religion that existed in the first century. Their religion is based on a new set of teachings.
Precisely what constitutes “Protestant” isn’t as clear cut as you’d think aside from the fact it’s definitely not Catholic or Orthodox. Simplistically, some classify all Christians not Catholic or Orthodox as “Protestant,” thought this really just means “Protestant” means “Not Catholic or Orthodox.” Mormons however are usually lumped into the set of Restorationist Christianity, which is different from Protestant.
To usefully define Protestant the common (still simple) approach is:
NOT Catholic or Eastern Orthodox,
But Christian, and
Adhering to a set of “cardinal beliefs” most Christians agree on, such as the Trinity or the inerrancy of the Bible.
I don’t consider Mormons to be Christian, much less Protestant. But they are a religion that uses Christian beliefs/ideas. The few Mormons I’ve known personally are fine people too.
A religion is always going to be seen as more like a cult when it’s created spontaneously by one guy, rather than evolving through various iterations over the course of hundreds of years. Especially when that one guy has some extremely out-there beliefs for the time, like polygamy. And especially when it contains weird racial theories, which to my knowledge, exist in the main religions but in a much more oblique form. And especially when the members are expected to contribute money to the religion - not to individual charitable causes that might have religious elements, but to the religion itself.
To me, the Mormon beliefs seem very strange and esoteric. And part of that undoubtedly comes from the contrast of the weird mythology to the very clean-cut, smartly-attired, modern and uber-American image that the Mormons project.
With that being said, they do have some ideas that I like. Forbidding alcohol, for instance. I think alcohol is extremely destructive and while I don’t think it should be banned by law (people would continue to get it, obviously), I think its use should be discouraged. (I don’t feel the same way about marijuana, caffeine, or nicotine, though, which I know they also forbid.)
They also seem to be less aggressively political than equally-conservative Protestant denominations. The Christian Coalition, Ted Cruz-type wing of religious fundementalism that is closely aligned with political goals, doesn’t really seem to include a lot of Mormons. So I like that.
I’d add a fourth qualifier: They split from the Catholic Church during the Protestant Reformation, or are descended (linear, with apostolic continuity) from a denomination that did. I don’t know enough about Orthodoxy to be familiar with its breakaway offshoots, but doubt anyone would call them Protestant.
Mormons definitely believe that “they were restoring an old religion not founding a new one”. In fact, the word “restoration” and the idea of restoring the ancient church figures prominently in Mormon doctrine.
They’re Western Christians who don’t follow the Papacy, so they get lumped with Protestants a lot. They’re culturally similar to “other” North American “Protestants.” But they’re not “Protestants” in a strict sense, because they don’t quite follow the principles of “Reformed Christianity.” Notably, the LDS have “Prophets” who keep writing new scriptures, which runs counter to the Protestant idea of the sufficiency of Scripture, as part of “sola scriptura.”
More significantly for modern Evangelicals, the LDS completely change the theology of Christianity. Protestants typically believe in a universally singular God who is the Prime Mover. Mormons really don’t.
It does? I don’t think the term is all that well defined, but people usually use it to mean a smallish group of believers that is insular, relatively new, and often (though not always) headed by a single person who is often (though not always) abusive of the followers.
As for the OP, it depends on your definition of “Protestant”, which is often (though not always) used to refer to Christian churches arising from the European Reformation started by Luther (and some others, but Luther was the big name) in the 16th century.
As to the factual aspect of the OP, the LDS church does not consider itself Protestant per se, but acknowledges the Protestant Reformation as essential to the eventual “complete restoration of the gospel” by Joseph Smith.
The recently departed President (Prophet, Seer and Revelator) Thomas Monson summarized his (and the church’s) stance on it here. In sum, they basically say “we are our own thing which is also the Correct Thing.”
(I’m tickled that another LDS thread comes along a week after I saw The Book of Mormon and am finally reading Under the Banner of Heaven.)
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I’m pretty sure there are English-speaking Eastern Orthodox who use the KJV as well.
Anyway, Protestant is a family of denominations united by a historical and theological connexion, it isn’t a catch-all term for “Not Catholic or Orthodox”. Mormons aren’t “Protestant”…
Mormons are not protestants. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints claims that their authority was received directly from God, passed by the laying on of hands, to Joseph Smith. It’s interesting that the only other Christian church that claims the authority from God, to act on behalf of God, is the Catholic church. Protestant churches claim their authority is from the congregation.
Saying the Church of *Jesus Christ *of Latter Day Saints is not Christian is simply an ignorance argument. LDS followers may not fit your definition of a “Christian,” but they are, non the less, dedicated to the teachings and atonement of Jesus Christ.