LDS Worship

The argument

Weekly services are held in meetinghouses. These take an hour and involve the blessing and taking of the sacrament of bread and wine in remembrance of the body and blood of Christ. Once a month the service involved personal testimony from the congregation. The sacraments in LDS church are called saving ordnances. Mormons believe they must not only have faith and repent but also be baptised (by immersion and by a Mormon priesthood holder) and bring forth good works. Mormons consider their weekly Eucharist as a means of renewing their baptismal covenant and being repeatedly cleansed from sin. Although the grace of Jesus plays a role in salvation, each Mormon must "work out his own salvation.".

Premises

Counter-arguments

A rebuttal is that the worship described — weekly sacrament services in remembrance of Christ, congregational testimony — is largely shared with Christian worship generally, so it identifies little that is distinctive to Latter-day Saint belief. The account tells us the LDS meet and take a sacrament, which most Christian traditions do. More pointedly, the works-inclusive soteriology it states — that each member must "work out his own salvation" through faith, baptism and good works — is one that many other Christian traditions dispute, and mainstream trinitarian denominations contest whether LDS theology falls within "what Christians believe" at all. Presenting it plainly as one entry under that heading glosses a genuinely contested classification.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Weekly sacrament services in remembrance of Christ describe a practice shared broadly across Christian worship, so they identify little distinctive to LDS belief. [Rejecting P3] That "each member must work out his own salvation" through works marks a soteriology many other Christian traditions dispute, so presenting it plainly under "what Christians believe" glosses a contested classification.