What are "dead works"? Moroni 8:23

What are "dead works"? Moroni 8:23

Moroni is adding a few additional things to his father Mormon's life's work - the abridgment of the ancient records, compiled into a book (cough cough hence why it's called the Book of Mormon). He is just biding his time before the Lamanites find him and murder him.

He adds some thoughts about infant baptism. Latter-day saints do not baptize infants. In order to become a member of the church, you must be baptized and then confirmed. This is done after you are at least 8 years old. You also can't just call up the missionaries and schedule to be baptized the same day. You actually have to go through a series of lessons and interviews in order to prepare for and qualify for baptism. If you have committed certain very serious sins, you will not be allowed to be baptized until those are resolved through the process of repentance, which can involve talking to your bishop. For example, if you murdered someone. There are others, but I don't know them. The missionaries conduct some of these interviews, I believe, except for children who are born to parents who are members of the church.

All that stuff if subject to change because it squarely falls into the "policy" section of my church.

What will not change is the stance towards baptism. Because it is a covenant with God, it is considered "solemn mockery" before him to put an infant through the motions of making a covenant that they obviously are powerless to conclude. It is a serious sin to baptize infants.

Though, I'm fairly certain that this twisted doctrine has been far more beneficial in the end, since it was one of the main reasons to preserve the birth records of many devout Catholics: to keep a record of their baptism, and also of their birth. I personally do not feel like my Catholic ancestors were vile sinners for baptizing their children. Nor do I feel like devout Catholics today are willfully doing something deeply, disturbingly wrong.

Though, it does deeply disturb me, the idea that without baptism, everybody - including innocent children who die - is totally lost and will not be able to enter God's presence again. That does not sound like the plan of a loving God to me.

God does love us. And baptism is essential for all people who died accountable for their sins. Little children are automatically saved through the atonement of Jesus Christ. Everybody who died after the age of 8 will get an equal chance to receive exaltation. How? Through proxy temple work.

That is why I spend so much time and effort involved in family history and temple work. 

To say that infants need to be baptized is mockery before God because doing so denies the mercy of Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Ghost by putting trust in "dead works" instead of in God himself. It's like believing that the baptism itself is what causes someone to be saved rather than Jesus Christ's power. It's not the act of being immersed under the water that actually matters for our salvation, it's God's power blessing us for being willing to be strictly obedient to his commandments! The covenant had to be something, why not being immersed in water?

Doctrine and Covenants 22:2 says that if a person is baptized a hundred times, that isn't going to make him cleaner or more saved. It's not about following some specific set of laws perfectly. The only way to be saved is through Jesus Christ's atonement. Keeping the commandments shows that we value and believe in his power and atonement.

Other dead works might include some of the newly-retired programs in the church such as BSA and some of the other weird YW's things. They were good for a time, but when that time has passed, if we are focused to heavily on medallions or merit badges and lose sight of Jesus Christ himself, it's so useless, it's as if it were "dead." It is not through mere participation in the motions of church service and worship that we gain a testimony, but through actually developing a real relationship with our Savior. The two are connected, but they really are not the same.