And much to my dismay my fellow Mormons are just as guilty in the "one true church " rhetoric.
Joseph Smith said we must Seek and accept truth wherever we find it. So why is it that I find in church when someone quotes something the question is not "is that true" it's "who said that?"
Shouldn't we, as he said, accept truth from wherever we find it? Do we trust more in authority and titles than in our own ability to recognize truth when we hear it?
Do we make up our own minds before assessing all verifiable evidence and then only consider that which validates our preconceived notions?
At various times I have considered myself LDS, atheist, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist and thanks to the Sufi movement Muslim. But I kept studying myself into one faith after another not because I was flip flopping but because I was searching.
I couldn't pinpoint what I was searching for other than I wasn't looking to understand an infinite God that I'm not sure I can or ever was meant to fully understand but I was searching for an experience with the Divine.
One truth I found evident in my spiritual travels is that the core as I see it in each faith I delved into was that love for God and your brothers and sisters is the essence of each faith. I saw dogmatic sticking-to-the-rules-despite-the-outcome kind of logic in play in every faith and denomination I have ever encountered.
No faith or demographic of people or political party is immune to hate, fundamentalism, dogmatism or corruption.
Just as how one man leads his life is not reflective of how another man lives his when they've both lead different lives and the only commonality is the church they go to or their political party. People share these things without being identical in their dealings or speech. One cannot rightly condemn those who belong to the same faith when one member commits a crime and another has not.
When it comes to Chritians or Muslims not all members are the same. Not all Christians own guns or bomb abortion clinics just as all Muslims are not terrorists. There are thousands who have committed these crimes but there are billions of each faith. Not all are guilty.
The reason I've brought this up is to show that not every member of the LDS faith or every mainstream Christian is actually Christlike and a true disciple based on the creeds they've supported and agreed to.
Beliefs do not make one a better person, behavior does. Jesus said His disciples would be known by the love they had one to another. Love is key. Acceptance and forgiveness, offering and accepting light, knowledge and understanding are all indicative of the ethos a true disciple will have but it is incomplete without acting on said beliefs.
One cannot be Christlike without acting like Christ.
So it's not that all Mormons are Christians and no one else is or that only Catholics are Christian. It's that those who heard Christ and truly listened and act on the love He said His disciples would be known by are Christian.
Maybe not every group is truly Christian. But anybody who acts on the Christlike love and walks the walk of Christ and follows that path can become Christian.
Discipleship is not about doctrines or creeds as much as it is the love we have one to another.
Sometimes one can be incorrect in facts and correct in love. And love for others is how I have experienced God as I had longed to do and searched far and wide, high and low until I finally followed Jesus' example as best I can.
Everyday I get better and when I have a set back I pick myself up and keep going. Because righteousness is a path more than a just destination.
Just as a married couple can't stop trying once they've been married they still need date nights and to listen to one another one can't perform any rite that forever makes one Christian. It is a matter of following Christ's example every day as best you can and as best as you understand it.
Maybe we can't change who we've been or even who we are but through consistent action we can change who we become.
It's true not everyone is truly Christian but anyone can choose to be and act like Christ whenever they wish or whenever they're ready.
