What Do Mormons Believe About the Holy Spirit?
The Gospel Coalition
Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) view the Holy Spirit in ways both familiar and foreign to traditional Christianity.
In Mormonism, the Holy Ghost is the Spirit of God, the divine Comforter. He’s not holy simply because he’s pure and sinless—that’s obvious by his membership in the holy Godhead alongside Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. Instead, the Holy Ghost is holy because he sanctifies or “makes holy,” helping Latter-day Saints to become “pure and spotless before God,” according to the Book of Mormon (Alma 13:12).
Further, the Holy Ghost isn’t an impersonal power; he’s a “personage of Spirit” according to Joseph Smith. The Holy Ghost has personality but lacks a physical body, unlike Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. “Were it not so,” Smith clarified, “the Holy Ghost could not dwell in us” (Doctrines and Covenants 130:22). Yet like the Son, the Holy Ghost was a “spirit child” born to the Father. The three are united by perfect purpose, will, and love, but they don’t share a common essence (contra Trinitarianism).
