LDS Questions Answered: Straight Answers from All Four Standard Works

People ask Google and AI about our faith every day, and a lot of the answers they get come from people who have never read our scriptures. These are the straight answers. Each post opens with the short version, names the assumptions hiding inside the question, and then shows the work from all four standard works.

No spin, and no watered-down apologetics. If a question has a hard part, the hard part is in the post, sourced. If a critic’s question rests on a premise he never defended, you’ll see that too.

Pick a topic below. Every question links to the full answer, and each entry gives you the one-line version first.

God and the Godhead

• Do Latter-day Saints Believe in the Trinity?They believe in the Father, Son and Holy Ghost as three distinct Persons, one in purpose, not one substance.
• Was God Once a Man?Yes. Joseph Smith taught that God “was once as we are now,” and that the Father had a Father. He is still and always our Father.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe in a Heavenly Mother?Yes. The Church teaches we are children of heavenly parents.
• What Is the Gift of the Holy Ghost?The Holy Ghost is a personage of Spirit, and His gift comes after baptism by the laying on of hands, as in Acts 8 and 19.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe Jesus and Satan Are Brothers?Only in the sense that every spirit is a child of God. Christ is the Firstborn and Savior; Lucifer rebelled and fell.
• What Is the Adam-God Theory?Brigham Young’s 1852 teaching that Adam is “our Father and our God.” The Church rejects it; President Kimball denounced it in 1976.

Back to topics ↑

Jesus Christ

• Are Latter-day Saints Christian?Yes. They confess Jesus Christ as the Son of God, crucified and risen, the only name for salvation.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe Jesus Is God?Yes. The Book of Mormon calls Him “the Eternal God.” He is Jehovah and the Creator, the divine Son of the Father.
• What Is the Atonement of Jesus Christ?Latter-day Saints believe Christ’s Atonement began in Gethsemane, where He bled from every pore, was finished on the cross, and was crowned by His Resurrection.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe in the Virgin Birth?Yes. Latter-day Saints believe Mary was a virgin who conceived Jesus by the power of the Holy Ghost.
• Did Jesus Visit the Americas?Latter-day Saints believe the risen Christ visited the Americas, showed His wounds and taught for days (3 Nephi 11–28).
• Why Don’t Latter-day Saints Use the Cross?Not because they reject the Crucifixion, but because, in President Hinckley’s words, “our Savior lives.”
• Do Latter-day Saints Celebrate Christmas?Yes, on December 25, centered on Jesus Christ.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe in the Rapture?We believe the righteous will be “caught up to meet him” when Christ comes in glory, but not in a secret rapture years before.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe Jesus Will Return to Missouri?Latter-day Saints believe a New Jerusalem will be built in Independence, Missouri, but Christ’s Second Coming will be seen by the whole world.

Back to topics ↑

The Plan of Salvation and Eternity

• What Is the Plan of Salvation?The plan of salvation is God’s plan to bring His children home and make them like Him: premortal life, earth life, the spirit world, resurrection, judgment and kingdoms of glory.
• What Is the Premortal Life?Latter-day Saints believe every person lived with God as His spirit child before birth.
• What Do Latter-day Saints Believe About the Fall of Adam and Eve?A necessary step in God’s plan: “Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy.” No original sin.
• Are Latter-day Saints Saved?Yes, by the grace of Jesus Christ. But “saved” has six meanings in Latter-day Saint teaching.
• What Do Latter-day Saints Believe Happens After Death?The spirit goes to the spirit world, paradise or spirit prison, where the gospel is taught. Then comes resurrection and judgment.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe in Hell?Yes, in two senses: a temporary spirit prison and the permanent state of the sons of perdition.
• What Are the Three Degrees of Glory?Celestial, terrestrial and telestial kingdoms, taught in 1 Corinthians 15:40–42, John 14:2 and D&C 76.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe They Get Their Own Planet?That’s the cartoon. The exalted inherit “all that my Father hath” and create worlds without number, and He is always our Father.
• What Is Eternal Marriage?Latter-day Saints believe a marriage sealed in the temple by priesthood authority lasts beyond death.
• What Is the War in Heaven?A premortal conflict over agency and who would be the Redeemer. Lucifer was cast out, and a third part of the hosts of heaven with him.

Back to topics ↑

Joseph Smith and Church History

• Was Joseph Smith a Prophet?Yes, and the Bible’s own tests show it: fulfilled prophecy (D&C 87), good fruit, and testimony of Christ.
• What Is the First Vision?In spring 1820, 14-year-old Joseph Smith prayed in a grove and saw God the Father and Jesus Christ.
• What Is the Restoration of the Gospel?The Restoration is God bringing back the gospel, priesthood, scripture and ordinances through Joseph Smith, as Acts 3:21 foretold.
• Is Joseph Smith in the Bible?His name isn’t in it, but Isaiah 29, Ezekiel 37, Acts 3:21 and Revelation 14:6 foretell the work he did.
• Do Latter-day Saints Worship Joseph Smith?No. We worship God the Father and Jesus Christ and pray in Christ’s name.
• Was Joseph Smith a Freemason?Yes, he joined in Nauvoo in March 1842.
• Did Joseph Smith Own Slaves?No. In 1844 he ran for president on a plan to abolish slavery by 1850, and he ordained a Black man, Elijah Abel.
• Why Was Joseph Smith Tarred and Feathered?On March 24, 1832, a mob dragged Joseph Smith from a Hiram, Ohio, farmhouse and tarred and feathered him.
• Why Was Joseph Smith in Liberty Jail?Joseph Smith spent the winter of 1838–39 in Liberty Jail on charges from the Missouri conflict, never tried.
• Why Did Joseph Smith Run for President in 1844?Joseph Smith ran for U.S. president in 1844 after no candidate would protect the Saints.
• Who Was Oliver Cowdery?Oliver Cowdery was the Book of Mormon’s main scribe, one of the Three Witnesses and the Church’s second elder.
• Who Was Emma Smith?Emma Hale Smith was Joseph Smith’s wife, an early scribe, the “elect lady” of D&C 25 and the first Relief Society president.
• Who Was Brigham Young?The second President of the Church, who led the Saints to Utah in 1847 and founded hundreds of towns.
• Why Did the Latter-day Saints Settle in Utah?The Latter-day Saints settled in Utah in 1847 after mobs drove them from Missouri and Illinois.
• What Happened at Haun’s Mill?On Oct. 30, 1838, over 200 armed men attacked Haun’s Mill and killed 17 Latter-day Saints, boys among them.
• What Was Zion’s Camp?Zion’s Camp was the 1834 march of about 230 Latter-day Saints to help the Saints driven from Jackson County.
• What Happened to the Willie and Martin Handcart Companies?In 1856 winter trapped the Willie and Martin handcart companies in Wyoming. About 250 died; over 1,200 were saved.
• Who Was Parley P. Pratt?Parley P. Pratt was an original Latter-day Saint apostle, missionary on three continents, author and hymn writer, murdered in Arkansas in 1857.
• Who Was Hyrum Smith?Hyrum Smith was Joseph Smith’s older brother, a Book of Mormon witness, Church patriarch and Assistant President, killed with Joseph at Carthage in 1844.
• Who Was John Taylor?John Taylor was an English convert, apostle, Carthage Jail survivor shot four times, and third President of the Church (1880–1887).
• What Was the School of the Prophets?The School of the Prophets met in Kirtland from 1833 under D&C 88 and 90 to train elders by study and faith. The Word of Wisdom was revealed during it.
• Who Was Eliza R. Snow?Eliza R. Snow was Zion’s Poetess, Relief Society leader and author of “O My Father,” the hymn that put the doctrine of a Mother in Heaven into song.
• What Was the Nauvoo Expositor?The Nauvoo Expositor was a dissenters’ paper with one issue. Nauvoo’s council declared it a nuisance in June 1844 and destroyed its press.
• Who Was Martin Harris?The Palmyra farmer who paid to print the Book of Mormon and became one of the Three Witnesses. He left the Church for a time and never recanted.
• Who Was David Whitmer?One of the Three Witnesses. He left the Church in 1838, was later mayor of Richmond, Missouri, and died in 1888 still bearing the same testimony.
• Does the LDS Church Still Practice Polygamy?No. It ended in 1890 and members who practice it today lose membership.
• Why Were Black Members Restricted From the Priesthood?The restriction began under Brigham Young in 1852, not Joseph Smith. The Church now disavows the theories once used to explain it, and a revelation ended it in 1978.
• What Was the Mountain Meadows Massacre?In September 1857, Latter-day Saint militiamen in southern Utah killed 120 emigrants at Mountain Meadows.

Back to topics ↑

The Book of Mormon

• Is the Book of Mormon True?Yes. Eleven witnesses never recanted, and the book gives its own test anyone can take (Moroni 10:4).
• Who Wrote the Book of Mormon?Ancient prophets like Nephi, Mormon and Moroni wrote it on plates. Joseph Smith translated it by the gift and power of God in about three months.
• What Is the Book of Mormon About?A family flees Jerusalem around 600 B.C., sails to the Americas, and their descendants see the risen Jesus Christ.
• Where Are the Golden Plates Now?Joseph Smith returned them to the angel Moroni. Eleven witnesses testified they saw them, and Emma Smith felt them through a linen cloth.
• Is the Book of Mormon in the Bible?Not by name, but Latter-day Saints see it foretold in Ezekiel’s stick of Joseph, Isaiah’s voice from the dust, and Jesus’s “other sheep.”
• Where Did the Book of Mormon Take Place?In the ancient Americas. That’s the Church’s only official position.
• What Were the 116 Lost Pages?The first Book of Mormon manuscript, lost in 1828. D&C 3 and 10 explain why Joseph didn’t retranslate them.
• Who Is the Angel Moroni?The last Book of Mormon prophet, who buried the plates around A.D. 421 and returned as a resurrected angel to Joseph Smith in 1823.
• Who Were the Lamanites?Descendants of Lehi’s son Laman. The curse was separation from God, and the book itself says “all are alike unto God” (2 Nephi 26:33).
• Who Were the Jaredites?The Jaredites left the Tower of Babel, crossed the sea in eight barges, and fell in a final war.
• Who Are the Three Nephites?The Three Nephites are disciples Jesus promised would “never taste of death” but minister until He returns (3 Nephi 28).
• Who Were the Three Witnesses?Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris saw the plates in June 1829. All three later left the Church. None of them recanted.
• Who Were the Eight Witnesses?Eight men handled and hefted the plates Joseph showed them in June 1829. Some later left the Church. None recanted that witness.
• Who Was Mormon?A Nephite prophet and historian (about A.D. 310–385) who abridged the plates and named the book. He was killed after the last battle at Cumorah. The Church is not named as if it worships him.

Back to topics ↑

The Bible and Modern Scripture

• Do Latter-day Saints Read the Bible?Yes. It’s scripture alongside the Book of Mormon; English-speaking members use the King James Version.
• What Is the Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible?The Joseph Smith Translation is Joseph Smith’s inspired revision of the King James Bible, begun in 1830.
• What Is the Doctrine and Covenants?It’s a book of modern revelations, mostly through Joseph Smith, and one of four Latter-day Saint scriptures.
• What Is the Pearl of Great Price?It’s the shortest Latter-day Saint scripture: the Book of Moses, the Book of Abraham, Joseph Smith’s history and the Articles of Faith.
• What Is the Book of Abraham?Scripture Joseph Smith translated from Egyptian papyri bought in 1835 and published in 1842. Most of the papyri were later lost.
• What Is Kolob?Kolob is the great governing star the Book of Abraham says is nearest the throne of God, where one day equals a thousand years.
• What Are the 13 Articles of Faith?The 13 Articles of Faith are Joseph Smith’s 1842 summary of Latter-day Saint belief, now scripture in the Pearl of Great Price.

Back to topics ↑

Priesthood and Temples

• What Is the Priesthood in the LDS Church?The authority to act in God’s name, restored by John the Baptist and by Peter, James and John.
• What Is the Difference Between the Aaronic and Melchizedek Priesthood?The Aaronic Priesthood administers outward ordinances like baptism; the Melchizedek holds the keys of all spiritual blessings.
• How Is a Prophet Chosen?No election, no campaign: when a prophet dies, the Twelve lead, and the senior apostle is set apart as President.
• Do LDS Bishops Get Paid?No. Bishops are volunteers who keep their day jobs, serving 15–30 hours a week for about five years.
• What Happens in a Latter-day Saint Temple?Baptisms for the dead, the endowment and eternal marriage sealings.
• What Is the Kirtland Temple?The Kirtland Temple was the first Latter-day Saint temple, dedicated in 1836, where Christ, Moses, Elias and Elijah appeared. The Church bought it in 2024.
• What Was the Nauvoo Temple?The Nauvoo Temple was built by tithing labor from 1841, gave 6,000+ Saints their endowment before the exodus, burned in 1848 and was rebuilt in 2002.
• What Is the Salt Lake Temple?Started in 1853 and dedicated in 1893 after 40 years of granite work. Closed in 2019 for seismic renovation; a public open house is set for 2027.
• Who Can Enter an LDS Temple, and Why?Members with a temple recommend. Anyone can tour one at an open house before it’s dedicated.
• What Are LDS Temple Garments?A simple white undergarment endowed members wear as a symbol of Jesus Christ and their covenants, like Aaron’s holy garments.
• Why Do Latter-day Saints Do Family History?Because Malachi promised Elijah would turn hearts to the fathers, and “they without us cannot be made perfect” (Hebrews 11:40).
• Why Do Latter-day Saints Baptize for the Dead?Because Jesus required baptism, and God is just. The ordinance is offered by proxy in temples; the dead accept or reject it. Paul asked why in 1 Corinthians 15:29.
• What Is a Patriarchal Blessing?A once-in-a-lifetime priesthood blessing that declares your lineage in the house of Israel and gives personal counsel from God, like Jacob blessing his sons.

Back to topics ↑

Doctrine and Practices

• Can Latter-day Saints Drink Coffee?No: D&C 89 says “hot drinks are not for the body,” which Church leaders defined as tea and coffee. Caffeine isn’t named.
• What Is the Law of Chastity?The law of chastity means no sexual relations outside a legal marriage between a man and a woman, and full fidelity within it.
• Why Do Latter-day Saints Pay Tithing?Because Abraham did, Malachi promised blessings, Jesus said tithing “ought ye to have done,” and God restored it in D&C 119.
• Why Do Latter-day Saints Fast?Once a month they skip two meals, pray, and give the money to the poor.
• Why Do Latter-day Saints Serve Missions?Jesus said “teach all nations,” the sons of Mosiah couldn’t bear that any soul should perish, and D&C 18 says souls are precious.
• What Is the Sacrament in the LDS Church?Each Sunday, members take bread and water in remembrance of Jesus Christ and renew their covenants.
• Why Do Latter-day Saints Baptize at Age 8?The Lord set eight as the age of accountability (D&C 68:27), and Mormon called infant baptism “solemn mockery.”
• What Is a Stake in the LDS Church?It’s a group of congregations (wards) led by a stake president.
• What Is General Conference?General conference is a worldwide gathering held each April and October where Latter-day Saints hear the prophet and apostles.
• What Is the Relief Society?The Relief Society is the women’s organization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, organized by Joseph Smith on March 17, 1842.
• What Is the Gathering of Israel?Latter-day Saints believe in the literal gathering of Israel: scattered Israel is gathered to Christ by covenant, in stakes worldwide, through the temple and the keys Moses restored in 1836.
• What Is the Law of Consecration?Give all to the Lord and receive a stewardship (D&C 42). Voluntary, with God at its head, and never communism.
• What Is the Word of Wisdom?The Word of Wisdom is the Lord’s law of health in D&C 89, given in 1833: no alcohol, tobacco, coffee or tea, plus a promise.
• Do Latter-day Saints Believe in Evolution?The Church takes no position on the science, but teaches that God created man in His image and that Adam was the first man of all men.
• What Does the Church Teach About Tattoos?The Church discourages tattoos because the body is a temple (1 Cor. 3:16–17).
• Why Did the Church Leave Boy Scouts?In 2018 the Church and BSA jointly announced the end of their 100-year partnership, effective Dec. 31, 2019, for one global Children and Youth program.

Back to topics ↑

Answering Critics

• Is the LDS Church a Cult?No. Members worship Jesus Christ, read the Bible, and can leave freely.
• Is the LDS Church True?Yes. It is Christ’s restored Church, with His doctrine and priesthood authority, and you can ask God yourself (John 7:17).
• Is There a Faithful Response to the CES Letter?Yes, chapter by chapter: the Book of Mormon, translation, the First Vision, the Book of Abraham, polygamy, the witnesses and temples.
• What’s the Difference Between LDS and FLDS?The FLDS is a separate polygamous group, formally organized in 1991, with no tie to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
• Is LDS the Same as Mormon?Yes, both are nicknames for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
• How Much Is the LDS Church Worth?The Church’s Ensign Peak reserve held about $32B in stocks by 2018.

Back to topics ↑