The SMPT Conference Was Great!

So while Kevin Barney was at MHA last week learning about the latest thing the LDS Church "discovered" in its vault that it has actually known it had all along, I was attending the SMPT Conference in Claremont, CA. It was a fantastic event. I met quite a few new and interesting people, and also had the opportunity to spend some time with folks I knew from the message boards but had never met in person. (If you ever run across Blair Hodges at one of these events, ask him about "chocolate3". And if you ever meet Tyler Stoehr, have him tell you about the lives of Wittgenstein and Nietzsche.) Claremont is a very nice city and the conference was well put together. Kudos to Dan Wotherspoon and Ben Huff for organizing it!

One of the first papers I attended was "Do Mormons Really Believe That?" by Tyler Stoehr. Stoehr was asking what role the prophetic tradition should play in determining LDS doctrine. There are several different views. One is the Ostler/Robinson view, which borders on sola scriptura. Tyler seemed to feel that Ostler and Robinson have sold out to Protestantism in their zeal to provide an apologetic that Protestants will find acceptable. His own view accords more with Millet, for whom scripture and tradition must complement each other.

Next, in "Mormonism and the Religious Other," Jason Monson essentially argued for the possibility of an LDS version of the pluralist philosophy of religions. According to Jason, the LDS believer can hold that Jesus mediates salvation and that the Book of Mormon and Church are true, but not exclude the possibility of other mediators, revelations, and commandments that are equally valid and/or salvific.

Philip Clayton, John Cobb, Majorie Suchockie, and others argued for the possibility of reconciling Mormon theology with process theology. I generally found their arguments unpersuasive, mostly because of Mormonism's emphasis on materiality and anthropomorphism (in contrast to process theology's emphasis on process and transcendence). But then I'm biased against a process ontology from the beginning, since I find it horribly arbitrary and counter-intuitive. Other attendees seemed to find the arguments more persuasive than I did.

My own paper explored similarities between Mormonism and Pentecostalism-- of which there are many-- and suggested some explanations for why their attitudes about each other seem to be mostly negative in spite of their similar histories and theologies. In closing, I expressed doubt as to whether they can be reconciled without losing their distinctive beliefs and identities as faith traditions.

Daniel Peterson shared some personal reflections on interfaith dialogue, arguing that the participants in a good interfaith dialogue will be those who are truly dedicated to their traditions, not the liberals and outsiders who tend to be drawn to ecumenical types of activities. Then Dan read a paper by Farooq Hassan, a Pakistani Muslim scholar who couldn't make it to the conference. Hassan argued that Muhammad was tolerant and non-violent, and that Islam is a religion that lends itself to pluralism and acceptance of other faiths. It was definitely a one-sided and highly selective argument, but interesting nonetheless.

Blair Hodges, in "C. S. Lewis, Latter-Day Saints, and the ‘Virtuous Unbeliever,’" investigated some similarities and differences between Mormons and C. S. Lewis. Blair found that Lewis was a sort of soft inclusivist, but that his ideas in other respects were not as congenial to Mormonism as they are sometimes made out to be. Lewis held strongly to Nicene theology, insisted on the ontological gap between God and man, felt teetotalism was tyranny, and denied that baptism is a requirement for salvation.

Eric Dowdle and Martin Pulido argued against the popular feminist perception of Heavenly Mother in orthodox Mormon theology as the ideal and invisible heavenly housewife whose sole purpose is reproduction. They provided an impressive number of quotations from General Authorities and Church manuals that not only have Heavenly Mother participating in divinity, but that also portray her participating in the premortal council, creation, the superintendence of the world, and the judgment.

Follow the links to see some of my longer notes and reflections on a few of these that I found particularly thought-provoking.