Charlie Sebold (on Mormonism): Part of their strategy is to convince you that they are normal Christians and not weird people who revise history to exclude painful moments like Brigham Young's Avenging Angels, racism, polygamy, and so forth. And now (as Tracey said a moment later), they are appropriating Luther's name to set themselves forth as good Protestants. Clever.

It goes beyond just that too. I just had a conversation the other night about Mormonism with someone in my Bible study. Most of the weird rumors about Mormonism, like becoming gods and goddesses, secret rituals, baptisms of the dead, and holy underwear, have an element of truth to them, if they're not true outright.

But the Mormons' TV commercials suggest it's just another mainline Protestant church. Talk to the Mormon missionaries who come to your door, and the only differences that are likely to come up between their church cult and the church down the street is that they abstain from alcohol and caffeine, and perhaps that they have a second set of scriptures called the Book of Mormon.

They almost certainly won't tell you that the Garden of Eden was Jackson County, Missouri, and that when Jesus comes again, He's going to set up the New Jerusalem in the vicinity of Independence, Missouri.

They won't tell you this stuff because they don't know.

That's one of the really big differences between Christianity and Mormonism. The various denominations can look very different, sadly, and that's really confusing--and it plays right into the Mormons' hand. But whether you're Lutheran or Methodist or Nazarene or Eastern Orthodox or Roman Catholic or Assemblies of God or Messianic Judaism, there aren't any secrets. Everything the religion teaches is right there. It's in one big, indimidating-looking book, but it's all there. The shelves and shelves of books that most clergy have just provide commentary and insight on that one book--they don't add anything to it.

The Bible has different things to say to kids than it has to say to adults, but that's strictly because of levels of understanding. You don't study 1 Timothy in second grade because most second graders can't understand it.

Which also plays right into the Mormons' hand. A new convert to Mormonism can't go into the temple or know other things because he or she can't handle it yet.

But that's another big difference between Mormonism and true Christianity. In Mormonism, you attain the various higher levels. You work, and you earn your way, and the very best workers eventually become gods. That's how you tell the difference between Christianity and a cult--in Christianity, you don't earn stuff. Jesus already earned everything. So the focus is on God. In a cult, the focus is on you. That's also what makes cults attractive, because Americans like to do stuff.

Some Christian denominations have reputations for being more cult-like than others. The attribute that makes those denominations more cult-like is the focus moving from what God does to what you do. What we do isn't particularly relevant. What's important is what God did--Jesus righted all wrongs on that cross nearly 2,000 years ago--and what God continues to do in your life and mine, today. Get past giving yourself credit for the good things you manage to do in spite of your humanity and attribute them instead to God working in you and through you, and you'll reach new heights of mental health. I guarantee it.

The Mormon interpretation of God isn't like that at all. The way the Mormons tell it, God the Father and Jesus Christ are little more than intergalactic cheerleaders, sitting on the sidelines, rooting for us.

I don't need a cheerleader. I need help.

Joseph Smith and Brigham Young were con men. But I have to give them credit for being very brilliant con men. They built something brilliant. Hide the truth about your teachings by not teaching the people who bring new converts in. Train them up in how to talk about their faith, rather than in what their faith actually teaches. Of course a Mormon missionary is going to deny the weird things about their faith when they have no reason to believe those weird things actually exist.

I'll end with this. If the Mormons are right, I'm OK. If I haven't already been baptized by proxy into the Mormon faith, I will be. According to the Mormons, the only people who spend eternity in hell are the people who were Mormons and subsequently leave the faith. If the Mormons are right, I won't get very high in the intergalactic hierarchy that they believe is still to come, but I won't end up in hell.

If Mormonism is right, since I'm male, I get a pretty sweet deal. Mormonism has nothing desirable to offer women, other than eternity serving as baby factories.

But if Mormonism is wrong and Christianity is right, there's a serious problem. It's hard for a Mormon to know that the only way to get right with God is to confess that we're sinners and accept what Jesus Christ did for us in His life and death. They're too busy doing stuff. It's not impossible for a Mormon to believe that. But if you follow the practices of Mormonism, you're not going to have a healthy relationship with God, and you're going to be very distracted from what it is that God really wants.

And the God of Christianity sees women as people. Not baby factories.

I know which one I want.