Make Room For ‘Holy Envy’

Rev. Richard Mouw says he doesn’t classify the Mormon Church as being historically Christian.

But the president of Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif.,  nonetheless sees connections between the two faiths worth celebrating.

“They talk about God in ways that echo the classical Christian tradition,” said Mouw during a presentation at this week’s January Series at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich.

Worth considering, he says, is that Mormon Church makes up an ever-changing community that continues to reflect on its core, religious beliefs.

“My clear sense is that in recent years we have seen among  Mormons an emphasis on the centrality of the atoning work of Christ,” said Mouw during a discussion with Rev. Robert Millet, a professor of ancient scripture and emeritus Dean of Religious Education at Brigham Young University.

Mouw and Millet have co-chaired a behind-closed-doors dialogue between about a dozen evangelicals and an equal number of their Mormon counterparts for the last several years.

Both of them described how they have talked about key theological issues: the authority of the Bible, the person and work of Christ, the Trinity, “continuing revelations” and the career of Joseph Smith, the 19th century founder of the Mormon Church, also known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church).

To be sure, they said, there is disagreement on some important theological questions.

But they have also found that on some matters they are not as far apart as they thought they were -- such as on the crucial work accomplished by Christ on the cross.

A leading voice in initiating civil dialogue with other faith communities, Mouw emphasizes in his recent book, Talking with Mormons: An Invitation to Evangelicals, that “understanding Mormonism isn’t just about being nice, it’s a Christian mandate.”

It is important, Mouw states, to move beyond denunciation to dialogue, allowing both parties to express differences and explore common ground.

As they have met, said Millet, there “has been enough serious curiosity between us that these conversations have become candid, and it has become a tremendous learning experience.”

Mouw said the dialogue does not focus on such “smoking gun” issues as the golden plates that Joseph Smith, Jr., the founder of Mormonism, is said to have come across and from which he translated the Book of Mormon.

Nor, he said, does the dialogue spend time going through a checklist of doctrines, trying to determine what evangelicals believe on certain topics compared to what Mormons believe.

Rather, they engage each other on broader topics, such as discussing the worldviews that each faith group holds.

“We take the approach of asking who we are, who God is and what does it take to be reconnected and reconciled. How can we achieve righteousness?” said Mouw.

In other words, he said, “we don’t put out our best feature against their worst feature.”

While they do touch on areas in which they differ, they do it in a civil way, always seeking to build bridges between the two faiths, said Millet.

At the same time, he said, “It has been a great privilege to be able to talk about what we disagree about.”

Throughout, he said, members of the dialogue have sought to set aside their beliefs long enough to get a sense of why someone other than them believes what they do.

“For real interfaith dialogue, we have to be able to consider if another person’s belief could conceivably be true,” said Millet.

“We have to make room for holy envy.”

Read more from Mouw on his blog Mouw's Musings.

Read Mouw's CNN Belief Blog,"MyTake: This evangelical says Mormanism isn't a cult."

 For more on Millet, read  about him on beliefnet.com.