Is it possible to be a devout Mormon but not 'fundamentalist'?

So as not to hijack the GD thread I’ll ask this here. (And as a disclaimer, I intend no disrespect to Mormonism: I don’t find their beliefs any “crazier” than most religions so much as I find them a whole lot more recent and a whole lot more interesting than most.)

Is it possible to be a devout Mormon but not fundamentalist in terms of believing the Book of Mormon’s teachings? (I’m not referring to polygamy but to the notions of the Lamanites, Christ appearing in what’s now the U.S., the authenticity of the Golden Plates, etc.). Since there are mainstream Christians who doubt the virgin birth or the OT account of creation, etc., and since there are many Mormons in the sciences (and BYU is a very respected school in many departments) I was wondering if Mormons who like the core values of the church (family, community, etc.- all the things Mormons are most respected for) but also believe Joseph Smith was a very flawed person who may or may not have been divinely inspired keep such opinions to themselves or if it’s alright to express them and still be accepted as a Mormon.

I suppose so - are there “Reform Mormons”?

One can take Judaism as an example, where there is a continuum of belief among observant Jews from Reformed to Orthodox.

One could certainly argue that the core values of a religion span both theological and behavioural aspects, and that a fundamentalist observes and fully believes in all of these aspects.

I would expect a “fundamentalist” Mormon to fully embrace their theology - one certainly can have Mormons who practice the behavioural core values and yet have problems with the core dogma of Mormonism. So in that sense, they’re not fundamentalist Mormons.

One could argue that there are denominations within Mormon, but I’m not aware of a fully developed range of such things. One could be a dogmatically-compliant Reformed Mormon, if such a thing existed.

But being “fundamentalist” means fully embracing the dogma of the religion.

I’m sure there are some Mormons who deep-down don’t fully believe all of the teachings, but still attend church and keep up the “appearance” of being active members.

However, one of the central doctrines of the Church is that God speaks to prophets in our day, just like he did in biblical times, starting with Joseph Smith and continuing today with Gordon B. Hinckley. This includes the Book of Mormon and all of the other things that go with it.

For believers, it comes down to a black and white choice. Either the whole package, including Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon and the rest are true, or Joseph Smith was a fraud and the Mormon Church is false.

Generally, people who come to disbelieve in the central doctrines don’t tend to hang around the Church because they’re not comfortable there.

I had a very interesting discussion one time with the family of some Mormon friends of mine.

One thing that they took great comfort in was that all observant Mormons throughout the world believed in exactly the same theology and practice, that all Mormons followed the same teachings of the Church. This is in stark contrast to my Jewish perspective, which is that if there are four Jews in a room, there are six opinions.

So, my understanding is that the LDS Church hierarchy dictates theology and belief, and that all devout Mormons are obliged to follow that belief system.

Well, sort of. It’s really both; Mormons all have the same theology and practice, and they have differing opinions on, probably, most of those things. Any bishop can tell you that getting a bunch of Mormons to do something is like herding cats.

As for the OP question, FatBaldGuy pretty much covered it. There are undoubtedly social Mormons–but IME a lot of them don’t hang around all that long.

That’s an interesting comment, Dangermom, especially inasmuch as you imply that anyone who isn’t a fundamentalist (in the sense of accepting all of the “fundamental” teachings of the church) is a “social Mormon.” This is a big difference from most mainstream Christian churches (and even, I think, most Evangelical ones), in which you will find a variety of opinions about things such as the virgin birth, the resurrection, the historicity of the bible, the creation account, Adam and Eve, the flood, etc., with a sizable number regarding at least some of those as allegorical or otherwise non-literal. Those people would neither regard themselves nor be regarded by others (even those who view those people as being in serious error) as “social Christians,” at least not based on their beliefs alone. There certainly are social Christians, but that has more to do with the seriousness of their participation than the content of their beliefs.

shrug I wasn’t exactly thinking in a very detailed way. Mormons do have a variety of opinions, but not necessarily about the same topics as other Christians.

Creation is largely a non-issue; there is no official doctrine on it. Opinions differ widely, but it’s not a huge deal. It has pretty much nothing to do with salvation.

It would be difficult for a Mormon to argue about the existence of Adam and Eve; we are rather specific about them (we differ from traditional Christianity in that we admire Eve). But there’s plenty of detail to argue about in there.

The flood is mostly up for grabs (worldwide vs. local, that is). There are some theological ideas about it, and people like to argue them. Noah was a real prophet, as far as we’re concerned.

“We believe the Bible to be the Word of God, as far as it is translated correctly.” That means there are errors. And some of it is probably exaggeration or literary metaphor. For example, the story of Job could easily be a myth, but it has valuable lessons either way so who cares?

Anything about the reality of the virgin birth, the Saviorship of Christ, or anything like that is pretty well non-negotiable, along with the reality of the Restoration. That’s more what I would mean by a ‘social’ Mormon; someone who doesn’t believe those core doctrines but actively participates anyway.

I’ve known Mormons, and Morman fundamentalism is a hot topic in AZ and Utah. I’d consider the LDS itself ‘Reform Mormanism’. The fundamentalists still embrace Polygamy, because that’s what Joseph Smith taught.

If you drink coke, have a black friend, and only one wife, you’re a ‘reform’ Mormon.

Well, I do for one, but then I enjoy discussing that sort of thing. Surely there are Mormon scholars of religion who find that sort of thing interesting and significant, too?

In mainstream and evangelical Christianity, I don’t think there is any similar set of beliefs that would only be questioned by “social Christians.” (IME, the same is true of Judaism and Buddhism.) Even the saviorship of Christ could be interpreted in a fairly loose way. A person who did so might be regarded as a godless secular liberal by an evangelical Christian, but I think the existence of liberal Christianity is widely enough recognized that even a hard-core evangelical would probably recognize that the holder of such an interpretation may be genuine and sincere in regarding himself as a Christian, even if the evangelical disagrees.

I’m not arguing that the situation isn’t as you describe within Mormonism, or that it shouldn’t be, just pointing out that it is a pretty significant difference with most (not all) other denominations.

Yes, of course. But theologically speaking, it’s not important to one’s salvation. It’s an interesting question, but not one with far-reaching implications as far as doctrine is concerned.

Yes, I know. I’ve even read some Spong. But Mormons are a bit different that way. We take it very seriously indeed. The Saviorship of Jesus Christ is the foundation of our religion, and there’s no fooling around with it.

As for the definition of “fundamentalist Mormon:” it’s true that the actual term is used by polygamists to define themselves. (IMO in doing so they ignore some other key teachings of Joseph Smith, but that’s beside the point.) Sampiro was asking a question which I think was quite clear, and it’s been answered. We’d use different technical terms, but I don’t think that matters much in this thread.

At any rate, I have to teach the 5-yos tomorrow morning (on the Golden Rule), so I need my sleep. I’m done for the night.