While Latter-day Saints do not display crosses (not just crosses with the body/corpus of Christ on it), and, further, we reject the Second Council of Nicea’s dogmatic [and false] teachings on icons/images (part of dogmatic theology of both Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy), this should not be taken, as it is by many misinformed critics, that Latter-day Saints are “enemies of the cross” (Phil 3:18). On this issue, LDS scholar Andrew C. Skinner wrote:
For Latter-day Saints, the symbol of the cross of Christ is as important, is as much a part of our theology, as it is for other Christians. Though latter-day prophets, under divine inspiration, have chosen not to display or portray material representations of the cross (icons) in our buildings of worship, the symbol of the cross of Christ still buds us to do as Christ did:
1. To forgive all men (D&C 64:10)
2. To extend mercy to others—that we may obtain mercy (3 Nephi 12:7; D&C 88:40)
3. To put others before ourselves and serve one another (Mosiah 2:17)
4. To take up our crosses and follow him (Matthew 10:38; Luke 9:23)
5. To endure all things with patience and dignity (D&C 67:13; 1 Peter 2:23)
The image of the cross of Christ lies at the heart of the foundational document of our religion—the Book of Mormon. In describing his early visions, the prophet Nephi testified that he “saw that [the Lamb of God] was lifted up upon the cross and slain for the sins of the world” (1 Nephi 11:33). But the capstone testimony regarding the cross came approximately six hundred years later when another Nephi reported the New World visitation of the very God of whom Lehi’s son Nephi had prophesied. He resurrected Lord Jesus Christ affirmed to his American Israelites that he had come into the world to do his Father’s will: “My Father sent me that I might be lifted up upon the cross; and after that I had been lifted up upon the cross, that I might draw all men unto me, that as I have been lifted up by men even so should men be lifted up by the Father, to stand before me, to be judged of their works, whether they be good or whether they be evil” (3 Nephi 27:14) . . . . In the dispensation of the fulness of times, President Joseph F. Smith received a panoramic vision of the spirit world and the Savior’s ministry to it. The Savior did not go in person to preach the everlasting gospel unto the wicked and rebellious (D&C 138:20-21). Messengers from among the righteous in the spirit world went instead (D&C 138:30-31). “It was made known among the dead, both small and great, the unrighteous as well as the faithful that redemption had been wrought through the sacrifice of the Son of God upon the cross” (D&C 138:35). Thus we see that the cross was preached beyond the veil. (Andrew C. Skinner, Golgotha [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2004], 183-84, 185-86)
Further Reading:
Michael G. Reed, Banishing the Cross: The Emergence of a Mormon Taboo (John Whitmer Historical (John Whitmer Books, 2012)
