Title: The Doors of Faith
Author: Terryl Givens
Publisher: BYU Maxwell Institute and Deseret Book
Genre: Religious Nonfiction
Year Published: 2021
Number of Pages:136
Binding: Paperback
ISBN: 9780842500555
Price: $14.95
Reviewed by Kevin Folkman for the Association for Mormon Letters
Describing the theology of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has always been a bit like trying to chase your own shadow. Lacking any kind of magisterium, like the Catholic Church, or a guiding statement of theology like the Westminster Confession of the Presbyterian churches, the LDS faith has left its theology up to a loose combination of professional educators, academics, and independent scholars, with occasional statements by general authorities. Joseph Smith himself decried creeds in general, saying that many churches:
…were all circumscribed by some peculiar creed, which deprived its members the privilege of believing anything not contained therein; whereas the Latter Day Saints had no creed, but are ready to believe all true principles that exist, as they are made manifest from time to time. [1]
This is an unusual stance for a church, like the LDS church, which maintains a strong hierarchical and authoritarian organization. While strict policies guide the administration of ordinances and rites in the church, there still exists a surprising amount of leeway for individual beliefs and interpretations within some basic boundaries. I suspect that Terryl Givens would resist being categorized as a theologian as opposed to a religious scholar. Nor is his latest book, The Doors of Faith, a primarily theological text. Yet, looking over his body of work, including several books with his wife Fiona, an argument can be made that Givens is following in the footsteps of other “accidental” Mormon theologians such as Sterling McMurrin and Eugene England. In The Doors of Faith, he writes about how to live a faithful life based on a foundation of theological insights.
The Doors of Faith is fairly brief at 136 pages, organized into four chapters, with the first a framework around the book’s title. Titled “A Willing and Witting Discipleship,” it describes the concept of discipleship as balancing the willingness of the heart to follow the example of Christ and the knowledgeable acceptance of the challenge based on reason. It is that combination of faith and reason that allows us to open those doors. “Only when something has been disturbed in our own mind are we open to new possibilities…” Givens writes. “Perhaps the most important doors that had to be opened were not the gates of church membership; perhaps they were the closed doors of our own perception.” [p18] It’s an intriguing idea that a paradigm shift is required to open us to new possibilities for spiritual growth. And what doors do we avoid opening?
If we use both faith and reason in our pursuit of discipleship, then it follows that a correct knowledge of the nature of God and our relationship with him is vital. The remaining chapters describe aspects of faith and how our theology informs them. Chapter two tells us that we are eternal beings, co-eternal with our Heavenly Parents, making it easier to understand such scriptures as Moses 1:39, where we are told that it is God’s purpose to bring about our immortality and eternal life, not just for His glory. It is a concept, Givens writes, “…that may well bring us closer than any other in religious history to a literalizing of God’s role and status as a divine parent, not a sovereign.” [p47]…”We are collaborators, long-time pupils working under conditions and covenants in which we actively and knowingly…participated.” [p56] This understanding of our relationship with Deity counters the capriciousness of creation ex nihilo and an immaterial and passionless God present in many other religions.
Chapter three deals with the atonement as the practice of God healing us through the sacrifice of His Son. Christ is “…our healer from woundedness, not our rescuer from depravity…We believe in a God who wants peers, not subjects, and we have confidence that they—God jointly—will bring us to where they are.” [p62]
The final chapter is about hope, but with an interesting twist. True faith is more than just hope. It is “…the commitment to be responsive and true and loyal out of love in the here and now, the present moment, with no conceptualization of a tomorrow…faith is manifest in the act, it is the gesture requiring willful effort, what Paul calls the actual work.” [p88-89] In this sense, we become partners in our sanctification and the sanctification of others through Christ-like love and service. Perhaps this vision of faith for our eternal prospects is best summed up in the words of Joseph F. Smith:
Jesus had not finished his work when his body was slain, neither did he finish it after his resurrection from the dead; although he had accomplished the purpose for which he then came to the earth, he had not fulfilled all his work. And when will he? Not until he has redeemed and saved every son and daughter of our father Adam that have been or ever will be born upon this earth to the end of time…that is his mission. [p108]
Faith, the first principle of the gospel according to the Articles of Faith, then is not a solitary act or passive hope, but the willing engagement of our hearts and minds in understanding and helping to open the doors of faith for ourselves and others. Faith without works is dead because true faith includes the work of becoming true disciples of Christ. In The Doors of Faith Terryl Givens us the key to opening many doors, all of which lead us back to our Heavenly Parents.
[1] Richard Bushman, Rough Stone Rolling, Vintage Books, New York, 2005, p 285