It seems like whenever the subject of free will comes up among religionists — especially Christian religionists — someone chimes in with some variation of this old chestnut: “Free will is not free!” (When Mormons use it they sometimes say “Free agency is not free” but the intent is the same.)

I disagree. I think that our free will is not only free, it is inescapable. In other words, I think that free will in the libertarian sense is entailed by sentience. As far as I can tell, you can’t have one without the other. (more…)

The discussion on my last post veered into a highly technical philosophy of mind debate so I wanted to pick up the core issue again here.

My take on the debate so far is that the Mormon compatibilists were left in an extremely tough spot. One of their main arguments was that we don’t understand how libertarian free will works so it must not exist. But Blake proposed a emergentist theory of how it might work and none of the compatibilists had any ammo to shoot that theory down. (And even if Blake’s theory does not prove to be the final reality behind LFW, not knowing how something works is hardly a powerful argument that it must not exist.) (more…)

I figured freedom would be a good subject for Independence Day here in the U.S.

Here is the question of the day: Does the Plan of Salvation and restored gospel even make sense if humans do not have free will in the libertarian sense?

Here is the answer for the day: No.
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Eric recently asked me how final I think “final” judgment is. The short answer is that I don’t think final judgment is very final, at least not in the traditional sense. There is nothing too earth shattering about this; the term “final judgment” is not scriptural to begin with. There are, however, lots of scriptural references to a time of judgment when all people will stand before God to be judged according to their works, and these scriptures must mean something. I am one of those heretics that believes in the continuation of free will after judgment, progression between the kingdoms of glory (i.e. the possibility of eternal progression for all but the SofP), and even the logical possibility of God’s downfall. In a personal theology with so much change and opportunity after resurrection, it becomes interesting to ask what meaning (if any) final judgment still retains. This is the question I intend to address in this post. (more…)

I’ve already gotten ahead of myself, because there is certainly someone out there who will dispute the idea that God makes decisions in the first place. If so, I am interested in that view. For my own part, I consider decision making to be an essential part of personhood, and I believe that God is a person.

If it turns out that I’m correct and God does make decisions, upon what does he base his decisions? (more…)

1 In the celestial glory there are three heavens or degrees;
2 And in order to obtain the highest, a man must enter into this border of the priesthood [meaning the new and everlasting covenant of marriage];
3 And if he does not, he cannot obtain it.
4 He may enter into the other, but that is the end of his kingdom; he cannot have an increase.
(D&C 131)

There is an interesting theological conundrum in Mormonism that doesn’t seem to get a lot of attention. The above passage is the first part of it. The doctrine taught in section 131 teaches that a person cannot be exalted singly and separately — rather a man must be sealed to a woman (and vice versa) for either to exalted. (more…)

“I Am a Child of God” is a classic Mormon hymn and it teaches a fundamental Mormon doctrine — all people are children of God. The problem is that most Mormons seem to assume they are only children of God the Father. Not so. Our scriptures clearly teach that all of the faithful are also children of God the Son. Here are some of the relevant passages.

We are the children of Christ:

7 And now, because of the covenant which ye have made ye shall be called the children of Christ, his sons, and his daughters; for behold, this day he hath spiritually begotten you; for ye say that your hearts are changed through faith on his name; therefore, ye are born of him and have become his sons and his daughters. (Mosiah 5:7)

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There is no debate over whether or not God is a person. On that point everyone agrees. The trouble begins when we try to pin down what it means to be a person and whether or not God can have all the characteristics we attribute to him and still be personal.

The Setup

The “otherness” of God so commonly stressed in traditional Christian theology creates problems in this regard. Our notions of what it means to be a person are derived from our experiences with other people. If God is radically unlike us, it becomes difficult to explain how he is still a person. (more…)

The theological assumption of most church members and leaders is that Satan is a person; not just a symbolic figurehead representing the source of evil and temptations in the world but a real spirit person who is really at work on the earth tempting us to do evil and generally working hard to make all humankind miserable. Elder Spencer W. Kimball expressed this opinion rather clearly in The Miracle of Forgiveness (as quoted in the SWK manual): (more…)

For the sake of expediency, I am going to take down my previous two posts in this series. While initially, I had intended to allow Widtsoe to speak for himself, the way I was parsing his quotes by topic was creating some confusion where it otherwise would not be, and was causing me to respond too often “wait and see” to issues which came up. More important, I was frankly just being lazy in my blogging. I hope no one is offended as my removing the two prior posts will delete comments. (more…)

In 1937, John A. Widtsoe presented the following test as a measure of spirituality. I really like what he says:

Spirituality in man or woman may be recognized by simple tests, of which the three following are of major importance:
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