Evidence · Case 11 · Mormonism
Doctrine and Covenants 1:30
One exhibit from the free evidence repository at apologetics.pro.
The Lord’s preface to the Doctrine and Covenants calls the restored church “the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth.” Latter-day Saint leaders such as Dallin H. Oaks and Boyd K. Packer treat this as fundamental, not incidental.
Sources
Objections & responses
- Latter-day Saint leaders have softened this language in recent decades, emphasizing that other churches have truth and goodness. Isn’t quoting the verse without the church’s current framing unfair?
The current framing is that other churches contain much good but lack priesthood authority and the fullness of the gospel, which is still the exclusivity claim; the church’s own Gospel Topics page, cited in the next exhibit, makes exactly that point. The tone has softened and the substance has not, and both facts are worth knowing when you talk with a Latter-day Saint who may not put it as bluntly as the verse does.