I’ve always been the guy who does consider Mormons christians. I don’t think it matters that they’re non trinitarian. That just makes one a nontrinitarian Christian. But more and more, with some family having converter and some friends, I’m more leaning towards them being a full blown cult, in the colloquial sense of that word. A Christian cult, but a cult. They’re huge which is really the only reason they’re not considered a cult. If their membership were 1700 instead of 17 million, pretty much nobody would hesitate to call the group headed by a charismatic “prophet,” that initiates members in a secret ritual, demands the wearing of sacred underwear, and teaches that God is an alien who will make you king of a planet when you die a cult. So, yeah, Christian. But a Christian cult.
The line of cult vs. religion has many criteria, but a big one is if it survives a generation or two after the death of the charismatic prophet. Usually it’s not considered both a religion AND a cult, it kinda graduates from cult to religion by lasting a long enough time.
I’ve always been the guy who does consider Mormons christians. I don’t think it matters that they’re non trinitarian. That just makes one a nontrinitarian Christian. But more and more, with some family having converter and some friends, I’m more leaning towards them being a full blown cult, in the colloquial sense of that word. A Christian cult, but a cult. They’re huge which is really the only reason they’re not considered a cult. If their membership were 1700 instead of 17 million, pretty much nobody would hesitate to call the group headed by a charismatic “prophet,” that initiates members in a secret ritual, demands the wearing of sacred underwear, and teaches that God is an alien who will make you king of a planet when you die a cult. So, yeah, Christian. But a Christian cult.
The line of cult vs. religion has many criteria, but a big one is if it survives a generation or two after the death of the charismatic prophet. Usually it’s not considered both a religion AND a cult, it kinda graduates from cult to religion by lasting a long enough time.
I wonder if it having continuous prophets changes that are all