# What Makes a Christian?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [January 29, 2014, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009 "2014-01-29T02:12:25Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/41 "2014-01-29T14:36:01Z")
**FriarTed** also not all Mormons believe in eternal progression (or as I think they call it, King Follett Theology ). I’ve interacted online with the Mormon blogger Russell Arben Fox, and he distinctly doesn’t.
---
### Author:  [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/42 "2014-01-29T14:36:31Z")
> [@FriarTed](#):
>
> If you mean the larger movement of Messianic Jews, no, it’s not, and I would also say neither is the specific JFJ organization, tho I at least understand that accusation.
I’m wondering the same thing. I new a Jewish woman in college who was a Messianic Jew; I don’t know why anyone would claim she was part of some kind of scam. I don’t know much about the JFJ organization although I did meet one of their leaders once who seemed pretty odd.
> [@FriarTed](#):
>
> The National & World Councils of Churches certainly don’t. If you can point to a major Christian organization outside of the LDS which does recognize it as Christian, I will certainly retract that.
Well, one _might_ be able to make an argument for the Episcopal Church based on the case of Bishop Catherine Tanner Irish.
Irish was born in 1940 in Utah to a family and baptized and raised in the LDS church. She drifted away from the church when she went off to college until her mid-20’s when she began attending an Episcopal church with her husband and children. She entered seminary in 1979 and was ordained in 1983 (she later became the third woman bishop in the Episcopal Church, in 1996 when she was consecrated as the Bishop of Utah.
When Irish was first ordained to the deaconate, then to the priesthood, and then again when she was elevated to the episcopate, questions were raised about the validity of her LDS baptism (and therefore her subsequent ordinations, since baptism is a pre-requisite to ordination). However, because her LDS baptism was determined to be sufficient at the time of her confirmation into the Episcopal Church, the rest of the sacraments of ordination were accepted as valid also.
So, there is _precedent_ for the Episcopal Church declaring that the LDS baptism is valid, indicating that Mormons are indeed Christian. I’m not aware that the General Convention has ever ruled definitively on the topic (I’d be surprised if they did); but I have not combed through the records. If I decide to do that I’ll report back.
As for myself, I’m hesitant to affirm Mormons as Christian because of certain fundamental doctrinal contradictions with Trinitarian Christianity - but I’m equally hesitant to deny the Christian-ness of anyone who claims to follow Christ. So when it comes to Mormons I withhold judgment.
---
### Author:  [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/43 "2014-01-29T14:36:33Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#):
>
> _That_ narrows the field a wee bit, doesn’t it? Of the major Christian organizations, no matter how doctrinally liberal & ecumenical, which ones don’t qualify(besides the Mormons, of course)?
I didn’t want to make things too narrow but I wanted to include what I regarded as the bare minimum of beliefs to be a Christian. While I regard Christian Science, Jehovah’s Witnesses, & Armstrongists as theologically erroneous, they don’t as radically re-define God the Father as does the LDS.
---
### Author:  [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/44 "2014-01-29T14:39:09Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#):
>
> **FriarTed** it’s strange to me that you would consider Marcionites not Christian. (Im not one, but I have more than a few sympathies that way myself). Their opponents considered them heretical Christians, but Christians nonetheless. I think Arianism makes much less sense than Marcionism- marcion was surely right that the Old and New Testaments are _very_ hard to reconcile, both morally and theologically, though it can be done. Steven Runciman, the historian of Manichaeanism and it’s precursors and successors, is clear that it was a _Christian_ heresy, not a heresy of anything else.
>
> At the loosest possible level, I’d say a Christian believes in God, that God lives us, and that Jesus Christ is the fullest and best self-expression of God, and that his life and death redeemed us.
Mariconism IS a heresy off of Christianity, yes. But it is so deficient that I cannot acknowledge it as acceptably Christian. The Gospels are very clear that to Jesus, the OT God was His Father, and the Tenack were His Holy Scriptures. Marcionism denies both.
---
### Author:  [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/45 "2014-01-29T14:48:02Z")
> [@Skammer](#):
>
> Well, one _might_ be able to make an argument for the Episcopal Church based on the case of Bishop Catherine Tanner Irish.
> …
>
> So, there is _precedent_ for the Episcopal Church declaring that the LDS baptism is valid, indicating that Mormons are indeed Christian. I’m not aware that the General Convention has ever ruled definitively on the topic (I’d be surprised if they did); but I have not combed through the records. If I decide to do that I’ll report back.
>
> As for myself, I’m hesitant to affirm Mormons as Christian because of certain fundamental doctrinal contradictions with Trinitarian Christianity - but I’m equally hesitant to deny the Christian-ness of anyone who claims to follow Christ. So when it comes to Mormons I withhold judgment.
I would regard TEC’s decision in this case to be one of making an individual exception rather than a wholesale acceptance, but I would not be surprised if TEC is an exception, now or soon, to my statement.
Now, I am only saying that the LDS doctrine of Eternal Progression is incompatable with Biblical or traditional Christian doctrine of God the Eternal Father. There may be individual Mormons who reject that doctrine or God may choose to accept the sincere faith in Christ of a Mormon in spite of that doctrine. In such cases, yes, individual Mormons may indeed be Christians in God’s sight.
---
### Author:  [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/46 "2014-01-29T14:49:25Z")
> [@Skammer](#):
>
> I don’t know much about the JFJ organization although I did meet one of their leaders once who seemed pretty odd.
JFJ is a Christian evangelical organization set up by a Baptist to convert Jews to Christianity. No mainstream Jewish group recognizes them as Jewish since they are pretty much evangelical Christians with a slight veneer of Judaism as a cover. And their goal is to convert Jews away from Judaism.
---
### Author:  [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/47 "2014-01-29T15:10:22Z")
> [@marshmallow](#):
>
> To me a Christian is anyone who believes Jesus was somehow supernatural or divine. Doesn’t have to be the Son of God. Some gnostics say he was a man who ascended to divinity through enlightenment. Or the Cathars, who thought Jesus was an angel. Though they thought we were all angels, but he was a special angel who came down to teach us how to be free of the evil world, or something like that.
Most Christians would not agree with this definition, both because they see a specific belief about Jesus, beyond simply that he was “somehow supernatural,” as fundamental to Christianity, and because being a Christian involves commitment/allegience/following Jesus, not just believing something about him. (“You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.” James 2:19)
> [@Der\_Trihs](#):
>
> This. A Christian is someone who calls themselves a Christian. Trying to use any other definition always turns into a crossfire of various self declared Christians claiming that _other_ people who call themselves Christian, aren’t.
But there’s something profoundly unsatisfying and unhelpful about a “definition” of the sort “A \_\_\_\_\_ is definied to be anyone who calls themselves a \_\_\_\_\_\_.”
---
### Author:  [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/48 "2014-01-29T15:18:44Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#):
>
> But there’s something profoundly unsatisfying and unhelpful about a “definition” of the sort “A \_\_\_\_\_ is definied to be anyone who calls themselves a \_\_\_\_\_\_.”
That is why, when someone tells me they are a Christian, I ask what sect/denomination/flavor they follow-the word itself hasn’t got a set definition.
Well, actually it _does_:
> [@dictionary.com](#):
>
> **Chris·tian** [kris-chuhn] adjective
>
> 1. of, pertaining to, or derived from Jesus Christ or His teachings: a Christian faith.
>
> 2. of, pertaining to, believing in, or belonging to the religion based on the teachings of Jesus Christ: Spain is a Christian country.
>
> 3. of or pertaining to Christians: many Christian deaths in the Crusades.
>
> 4. exhibiting a spirit proper to a follower of Jesus Christ; Christlike: She displayed true Christian charity.
>
> 5. decent; respectable: They gave him a good Christian burial.
, but if I put up primary definition #1 as _the_ definition of “Christian”, how many in this thread would accept it?
---
### Author:  [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/49 "2014-01-29T15:19:18Z")
Postscript: I checked the online [archives](http://www.episcopalarchives.org/e-archives/acts/) of TEC’s General Convention, 1975-2009, and was unable to find any reference to LDS or Mormonism. In another search I did find a resolution from 2012 recommending “interfaith” and “ecumenical” dialogue with Mormons - but I found similar resolutions in the archives using the same language to refer to dialogue with the African-American Methodist Church (certainly Christian) and Muslims (certainly not); so that’s inconclusive.
---
### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/50 "2014-01-29T15:27:16Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#):
>
> But there’s something profoundly unsatisfying and unhelpful about a “definition” of the sort “A \_\_\_\_\_ is definied to be anyone who calls themselves a \_\_\_\_\_\_.”
Then people should pick a term that has a more objective definition to identify themselves with, if it matters to them that much.
---
### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/51 "2014-01-29T15:36:26Z")
> [@llcoolbj77](#):
>
> To my mind, it’s pretty simple:
>
> - Jesus is the son of God
> - he died for the sake of man’s salvation
> - the path to heaven is to believe those two things
> [@ISiddiqui](#):
>
> Well, for a lot of Christians, the last point may be sticking point - which leads other people to say “Catholics aren’t Christians” because Catholics believe faith & good works leads to heaven (the “path to heaven” is more than just believing those things). There are also those Liberal Christians who don’t necessarily believe the path to heaven involves believing a specific thing.
>
> Regarding Mormons specifically, that Trinity thing looms pretty heavily ;).
It is admittedly a sticking point. But it’s not as divergent as some Protestants claim. Catholics also believe that the path of Heaven goes through God - they just believe it’s a different path. When a Catholic believes that certain acts can get you into Heaven, he isn’t saying the act alone is what does it. It’s God allowing you into Heaven in response to the act.
---
### Author:  [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/52 "2014-01-29T15:48:36Z")
> [@monavis](#):
>
> If Catholics aren’t Christian then the other churches are using the RC and Orthodox book as the word of God. The New Testament was Called the Word of God, and inspired by God, by the decision of the Roman and Orthodox Bishops it was they who threw out anything that the didn’t call inspired’; that was at the Council of Nicacea. in 325 (at the suggestion of Constantine). There were other writings that were in existence but were discarded. . So their beliefs are based on the words of people they don’t call Christian.
Corrections of fact:
The Nicene Council was called at the direction of Constantine.
It was not called to make up the rules of who would or would not be called Christian. Instead, it was called to resolve the specific dispute regarding the teachings of Arius. (The council ruled against Arius, but his teachings lived on for another century or so). Nothing was said about various Gnostic beliefs. Nothing was said about the monophysite controversy. The teachings that it proclaimed were the ones that were already held by the overwhelming majority of Christians in the world at that time.
The Nicene Creed that was published by the council was based on the text of earlier creeds that were already in use.
No action was undertaken at Nicaea to “throw out” any scripture that was not “inspired.” In fact, “scripture” was not even addressed in the Council. There is no declaration of what books are scripture and not even an appeal to scripture when announcing its decisions.
Aside from the rejection of Arian beliefs, the principle issues of the Council were the setting of the date on which to celebrate Easter throughout the church and the conditions under which people who had become apostates under the recent persecutions of Diocletian should be re-admitted to the church and how they should be treated once re-admitted.
This council did not set the scriptural canon.
This council did not suppress multiple forms of Christian belief; it only addressed two, choosing one of them. (In fact, when Constantine was finally baptized, twelve years later, he joined the group who had lost at Nicaea.)
It was not called by Constantine to make Christianity the official religion of the empire, (he, himself, remained a pagan for another twelve years). It was only to get the two largest factions of people who were already Christian to quit fighting.
[The Decrees of the First Council of Nicaea](http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Councils/ecum01.htm)
---
### Author:  [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/53 "2014-01-29T15:55:29Z")
> [@Monty](#):
>
> It’s exactly like that. IME, the ones touting “Mormons aren’t Christians” also hold to the line, “Catholics aren’t Christians.”
This is not even remotely true. I was raised in a very conservative Southern Baptist household, the son of a pastor, attended two different more-or-less fundamentalist Bible colleges, spent time on staff with Campus Crusade for Christ. 95% of the people I encountered in those environments would have said Catholics were Christians; Christians that had some wrong theology (just as Catholics would have said the same), but unquestionably part of the same household. We had Catholic guest speakers in college, read Catholic authors, my dad had priests over for dinner. In contrast, I have never once in all that time met anyone in those environments that regarded LDS as anything but a cult, in there with JWs.
Look at the doctrinal statements of the various denominations, the National Association of Evangelicals, and orgs like Campus Crusade, Focus on the Family, and you’ll see the same pattern. The anti-catholic stuff is actually one of the good litmus tests for separating mainstream evangelicalism from hard-core Jack Chick/Bob Jones fundamentalism.
Not saying that is or isn’t fair or right, but it most definitely is the reality, at least at present; I suspect this will change in the next 50-100 years.
---
### Author:  [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/54 "2014-01-29T16:01:42Z")
> [@furt](#):
>
> This is not even remotely true.
Did you not see where I said in my personal experience? Of course the major players, so to speak–the actual leadership of many of the groups–don’t hold to the old line that “Catholics aren’t Christians”; however, I can and have run into quite the number of fundamentalist types of many of the “mainstream” sects who still tout that Catholics aren’t Christians. And, oddly enough, they’re the very same people I usually encounter touting that the LDS aren’t Christians either.
---
### Author:  [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/55 "2014-01-29T16:17:26Z")
> [@Monty](#):
>
> And, oddly enough, they’re the very same people I usually encounter touting that the LDS aren’t Christians either.
I doubt that there is anything “odd” about it.
If a person (or group) is going around determining who is or is not Christian, they will probably have a set of filters. It would be more likely for a person who had already “filtered out” Catholics to then “filter out” members of the CoJCoLDS. On the other hand, Catholics might pass through several “filters” that would then eliminate Mormons.
---
### Author:  [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/56 "2014-01-29T19:50:10Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#):
>
> It is admittedly a sticking point. But it’s not as divergent as some Protestants claim. Catholics also believe that the path of Heaven goes through God - they just believe it’s a different path. When a Catholic believes that certain acts can get you into Heaven, he isn’t saying the act alone is what does it. It’s God allowing you into Heaven in response to the act.
I wasn’t saying Catholics are Pelagians - but the original third point of the OP said the path to heaven was BELIEVING those two things. You can believe the path to Heaven goes through God but more than simply belief.
---
### Author:  [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/57 "2014-01-29T20:06:53Z")
So, what have we determined?
[ul]
[li]People who call themselves Christians have their own standards about who else gets to use the label, and those standards vary from sect to sect and person to person.[/li][li]People who do not call themselves Christians don’t really care.[/li][/ul]
That about right?
---
### Author:  [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/58 "2014-01-29T20:14:34Z")
> [@andros](#):
>
> So, what have we determined?
>
> [ul]
> [li]People who call themselves Christians have their own standards about who else gets to use the label, and those standards vary from sect to sect and person to person.[/li][li]People who do not call themselves Christians don’t really care.[/li][/ul]
>
> That about right?
Works for me. Telling me you’re a Christian and expecting me to understand where you are coming from is equivalent to telling me a glass is full of fluid and expecting me to know what it tastes like.
---
### Author:  [@arielburns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/arielburns)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/59 "2014-01-29T21:03:27Z")
> [@marshmallow](#):
>
> To me a Christian is anyone who believes Jesus was somehow supernatural or divine. Doesn’t have to be the Son of God. Some gnostics say he was a man who ascended to divinity through enlightenment. Or the Cathars, who thought Jesus was an angel. Though they thought we were all angels, but he was a special angel who came down to teach us how to be free of the evil world, or something like that.
>
> Guess I leave out people who think Jesus was purely human but they like his teachings, but eh…so do Muslims and Jews. That’s pretty weak tea for a movement. Might as well be a Buddhist or a Jain instead.
What about people who think Jesus was an alien? Are those people also Christian? 😉
---
### Author:  [@Beelzebubba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beelzebubba)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2014, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009/60 "2014-01-29T21:18:38Z")
In addition to any specific set of theological beliefs (Holy Trinity, etc.), there is one essential thing that many ‘alleged’ Christians lack. To be a Christian is to follow the example set by Christ.
I consider myself Agnostic at this point in my life, although I grew up in the Church of God (Pentecostal) and was ordained as a youth minister by the Southern Baptist Convention when I was 19 (20yrs ago).
But my favorite Bible passage is in Matthew 25. Christian singer Wayne Watson wrote and recorded a song based on it called “The Least of These” and the lyrics have always been so profound but also beautiful, even now…
* * *
Did you feed me when I begged you
Fill my cup when I reached out in thirst
Take me in when I was homeless
When we stood face to face, would you or I come first
Did you answer when I called you
Visit when I was in need the most
Or clothed my back when I was naked
For in the least of these IS HOW YOU PLEASED ME MOST\*\*\*
It amazes me how many people call themselves Christians but never show any charity or compassion toward others…
_ **"Faith without works is dead."** _
[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009.md?page=2)
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-a-christian/680009.md?page=4)