30 Years and Still Waiting
So it’s been exactly 30 years since Official Declaration 2 allowed people of African descent full access to Mormon heaven, but still no official apology for or repudiation of this racist doctrine preached by its early leaders. It still teaches that the faithful should obey the words of the prophets. Ergo, the LDS church teaches a racist religion and is a racist church. This is not really open to interpretation; this is a well-established fact. You either accept it, or you don’t.
That’s not saying anything about individual Mormons, however.
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June 8, 2008 @ 8:14 am
Jonathan, it undermines your credibility to claim that a controversial subject like this is not open to interpretation. You’ve defined racism, here, as being unwilling to acknowledge the racist nature of past doctrine, even when present doctrine is not racist. I agree that the unwillingness to acknowledge the racist nature of past doctrine may reflect lingering racism, but it may also reflect arrogance, fear, calculated disassociation and a host of other non-racist causes, many of which may be bad, but not all of which are reducible to racism.
June 8, 2008 @ 8:20 am
I qualified that I wasn’t speaking about Mormons themselves. They are not generally very racist in my experience.
The Mormon doctrine and scriptures are extremely racist. Since there has been no repudiation of this racist doctrine, the canon of Mormonism remains racist. This is the fact that I was referring to. There can be no reasonable denial that Mormon doctrine was and still is racist (even though the racism isn’t emphasized today).
June 8, 2008 @ 8:31 am
That makes me unreasonable, then, because I observe no racism taught by the present LDS Church. The Mormon scriptures (both the Bible and beyond) certainly contain racist passages, but they also contain passages that justify all sorts of horrible things that most Mormons simply do not agree with (and, in many cases, never agreed with) — and Mormonism has taught since the beginning that scriptures are not inerrant. By not acknowledging the complexity of this matter, you’re undermining your case.
June 8, 2008 @ 8:43 am
I suppose we differ on what constitutes doctrine. I take the LDS church at its written and spoken word. This, take as a whole, cannot be denied to be racist.
You seem to see Mormonism as what Mormons believe. I agree that this is becoming less and less racist. I’m not talking about what Mormons believe, however. I’m talking about what their leaders teach publically when taken as a historical whole.
Mormonism has taught since the beginning that scriptures are not inerrant.
While Mormonism has taught that the Bible has flaws, it has traditionally not recognized any errancy in the Book of Mormon:
We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.
Some Mormons may believe that the Book of Mormon can have errors, but that’s not what we hear from LDS church leaders. I think you’ll be hard pressed to find a single quote from a church leader expressing skepticism about the Book of Mormon’s inerrancy. By considering the Book of Mormon inerrant, the LDS church tacitly endorses its racist doctrines.
June 8, 2008 @ 9:04 am
Jonathan, Mormonism is not Mormonism if we insist that its leaders and principal texts manifest perfect consistency or deliver an unchanged message over time. From the beginning, Mormon leaders have explicitly rejected such dogmatism, claiming both that revelation adapts to circumstance and that it is always received by fallible humans. Yes, even in regards to the Book of Mormon, our leaders have rejected dogmatism . . .
“Should the Lord Almighty send an angel to re-write the Bible, it would in many places be very different from what it now is. And I will even venture to say that if the Book of Mormon were now to be re-written, in many instances it would materially differ from the present translation. According as people are willing to receive the things of God, so the heavens send forth their blessings. If the people are stiff-necked, the Lord can tell them but little.†(Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 9: 311)
. . . even when some members hold on to dogmatism.
June 8, 2008 @ 9:20 am
Mormonism is not Mormonism if we insist that its leaders and principal texts manifest perfect consistency or deliver an unchanged message over time.
This is Mormonism in your view. This is not a shared view as you know. Your view is in direct contradiction to much of the rhetoric about an eternal gospel that comes from some church authorities and is believed by many (most?) faithful Mormons. Who is right about what Mormonism is? By what authority?
I’m impressed that you found that Brigham Young quote. Taken in context, Brigham Young was talking about adding truth to the truth that was already present in the Book of Mormon. He goes on to say that Moses couldn’t give the Jews the Christian gospel because they weren’t ready for that truth. He didn’t seem to mean that what the Book of Mormon teaches would be directly contradicted by later revelation, just added to. Given Brigham Young’s public record on race, I expect this is also true of its racist doctrines.
June 8, 2008 @ 9:23 am
And let me add further that if Mormonism is to be judged by what Mormons believe, then I have known many Mormons who are uncomfortable with the Exaltation Exclusion (a.k.a. the priesthood ban) but who believe that God must have had a good reason to have his prophets teach racism. This is a lukewarm form of racism.
June 8, 2008 @ 9:29 am
“. . . materially DIFFER . . .” means only to add? I disagree (and Brigham’s racism is a red herring).
That said, I agree that all of this reflects my interpretation of Mormonism, but I am neither alone nor uninformed regarding the Mormon tradition. Also, my interpretation does not reject the idea of eternal gospel truths: faith, hope and charity embodied in a participatory Christ (even if replaced with other words) are essential to survival, and as such are rightly the basis of doctrine.
June 8, 2008 @ 9:31 am
Jonathan, I, too, know individual Mormons that are racist. However, the present doctrine taught by the LDS Church is not obviously-racist, even if some feel to argue that it continues to manifest some subtle racist implications.
June 8, 2008 @ 9:37 am
My point is that official Mormon doctrine (or the closest approximation possible given that there is no such thing) is tacitly racist by refusing to exclude racist statements from the canon of inspired teachings (i.e. the Standard Works which is safely said to be an official source of doctrine).
June 8, 2008 @ 9:50 am
Okay, but then we’re also tacitly endorsing all sorts of horrible things mentioned in the standard works (particularly the Old Testament) that almost none of us actually believe.
June 8, 2008 @ 11:37 am
Yet they teach it’s the word of God, as far as it’s translated correctly.
BEEHIVE said,
June 9, 2008 @ 2:06 pm
Well duh! Of course no one is going to apologize because that would mean that they were in the wrong! (gasp)
I find the entire “Exaltation Exclusion” very interesting, because the church dropped the banned at a very convenient time. From what I understand, the church was under extreme pressure to change its doctrine so, after a revelation from God, it was announced that EVERY worthy person could receive the priesthood. I wonder if in the future, the church will also change its doctrine (give-in) and let women have the priesthood or fully embrace gays into the fold. Ah, that would be quite interesting.
June 10, 2008 @ 6:05 am
Many gay Mormons see parallels between the church’s former stance on race and its current stance on homosexuality.
Recall that the church was solidly against interracial marriage, even after the civil rights movement and the Supreme Court’s 1967 Loving decision that legalized interracial marriage nationwide. It’s no surprise that the LDS Church is against gay marriage too.
June 10, 2008 @ 8:40 am
Let’s hope. Depending on the topic, the LDS church seems to lag behind American culture by 15–50 years.