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Thanks Ray , If i’m hearing you correct you are saying you see the hand of God in the current teachings but the membership (and you spread the blame around here to include all levels) are not ready to interpret them correctly. I would have to get pretty abstract to agree with you here but generally speaking I believe in where we are going as a church not in where we are. I believe that God watches over the whole human family including the church . The fact that we can see the hand of God working in the church does not force me to the same conclusions it does you. But thank you for finding common ground. hawkgrrrl wrote:That’s of course what Prop 8 was about–whether it was the right of the people of the state of CA to decide or not. They had voted against SSM, and the court overruled their vote. Prop 8 was to restore the matter to the vote of the people.
Question Hawkgrrrl , Aristotle once asked ,
” does democratic behaviour mean the behaviour that democracies like or the behaviour that will preserve democracy ? “
It isn’t so simple . I ment what I said in the sence that church and state shouldn’t mix , I feel as a church we crossed the line here as many have stated .
Thanks Ray couple quick thoughts Old-Timer wrote:also have said in many places that I see multiple, clear ways that gay members can be more active in the Church without having to forsake the current wording of our core covenants, but I don’t think the membership in general is ready for that.
Hear is one of the big differences in our approaches, I don’t think it is the membership in general that is not ready , If they are not ready it is because of leadership that they are not . Change should start at the top and I really don’t think church leadership is just waiting for membership to catch up to them here . Many young people in the church seem quite ready for change. Perhaps a younger core in leadership would be helpful here. As for the clear ways I personally don’t see them, I think it would be a nightmare being gay in the church right now.
Old-Timer wrote:Personally, I think that the stance on gay marriage legislation is focused as an attempt to keep social inhibitions in place that would discourage those who are more “soft-wired” from sexual experimentation and influence those who could end up sexually active as straight, bi-sexual or gay to “choose” heterosexual activity over the other alternatives.
On this point strait people don’t encounter this at all. It is the law of chastity that is suppose to keep straits from sexual experimentation (we are not trying to use the law to curb strait pre marital sex). People are less likely to marry someone they don’t love. If two people are in love it shouldn’t make any difference who they marry . So perhaps it is the law of chastity that should change here. Using the law to prevent bi-curious people from sexual experimentation and help them make the “right choice” at the expense of the gay community , I’m not buying this one at all. As for kicking abused women when there down that seems Christlike
😯 ?Old-Timer wrote:Given the Church’s most recent alterations to its official statements regarding homosexuality, I’m fairly certain that the apostolic consensus recognizes those who are “hard-wired” as being unable to live the Law of Chastity as currently constituted
Ray do you know where we can look at this recent official statement ? I have never read it but would be intrested in the wording. Thanks.
Valoel wrote:NOM = people who want/need to stay positively engaged with the Church, but don’t believe anymore.
StayLDS = people who lost faith, but want to believe again in the LDS Church
Valoel , I can’t afford the therapy to tell the difference between these two motivations for staying
This is one of those hot button issues , and I consider it the issue of our day , I do feel future generations will look back on this time and the church will regret much of its actions and rhetoric. On the issue of same sex marriage I agree with Valoel on these points
Valoel wrote:Me personally, i’m fine if same sex couples have all the same treatment, benefits, or whatever government gives to traditional married couples. I really don’t care. That seems fair to me.
I could have written this myself, I would add how uncomfortable I am with the church getting envoled in politics and with the arrogance of presuming to be able to say what constitudes a family in free society. Legalized SSM to me is not a church issue it is up to the people of free society to decide. If we as a church are going to be involed in politics and begin using rhetoric and so on to sway our members how to vote we may as well bring back the People’s Party. I should add I feel the church has not had a great record when it comes to mixing church and state and i’m suprised we still haven’t learned yet .
As for the issue of Homosexuality . Here we teach love the sinner but not the sin. To me loving a person means excepting who they are fundamentally. I don’t see how you can truly love a person while looking down your nose at who a person is at there core. I find myself embarrassed not just by the church’s stance on SSM but also their stance on homosexuality in general . Everyone I know, knows that I am LDS and I feel guilty by association on this topic ( in the same way I represent the church it represents me so it is a strange relationship when you are at odds with church teachings) . I often wonder to myself what the point of having a prophet is when they don’t seem to get it right on any social issue from feminism to civil rights to homosexuality ( that’s a retorical question ) ? I know people say they see through glass darkly, and others are likely to say homophobia is a unavoidable consequence of restoring the church in a certain day. But when the writting is on the wall for so many of us it really makes me wonder? To be honest it looks to me like we are more intrested in protecting ideas than people . WWJD ? I have considered the pain the homosexual must encounter being raised in the church and think what a horrible isolating experience it must be. Yes this topic is deeply rooted in religious disagreement and people don’t see how it would work doctrinally as Valoel says . I often wonder what a early saint would think if they were transported to our modern church lets face facts it is not the same theology not even close. To me the church has lasted as a result of it ability to change with the times ( a day late and a dollar short yes , but still adapt ). I have heard plenty of interpretations of Biblical passages so as to be inclusive to the homosexual lifestyle and there are a growing number of church’s who have evolved to include the homosexual community . In short doctrinally we could do it if our leadership would take off its dark glasses and learn the difference between revelation , cultural bias and educated guesswork. After all the people of this church believe the leadership speak the words of God and in my experience they believe what they are told to , for the most part. I wish the church would be on the forefront of leading the charge for progress instead of being what I consider trapped by the sins of our fathers.
Salo
Old-Timer wrote:Do you see my comments here as “excuses, rationalizations and philosophical reflections” that “turn (your) stomach” and are “unexcusable”?
Absolutly not
Ray , i’m switching to PM for a more complete answer. I feel I have tried to demonstrate best as I can my position on this topic , and feel I have tried to show some of the lasting effects not just of the ban but also racism in general within the church . I have tried to show what I consider the ugly side of the teachings on premortal existence . I have stated my case, rough as it may be , but I don’t think I can continue in this thread any further . Please wait for my PM.
Thank you Salo
Old-Timer wrote:Does this mean you believe that anyone who tries to understand the ban and why it was allowed to happen, chalks it up primarily to racism, but accepts the Church’s inability to issue an actual apology (since it simply might have been an unavoidable part of restoring the Gospel in the early 1800’s in America)
To me if this is the reason (primarily racism ) for the ban yes a formal apology should be given. Do what is right let the consequence follow.
Old-Timer wrote:– or who doesn’t think the examples of Nephite racism toward Lamanites should be conflated with the Priesthood ban (and, therefore, should not be the basis of an apology) – or who comes to a conclusion that is not “the Church needs to apologize for racist statements in the Book of Mormon” (for example, because they believe such statements are accurate examples of the Nephite’s racism)
If this is the case it needs to be taught clearly as as such , The church leaders and CES have obviously failed to teach this if no one in the church understands it that way .
Old-Timer wrote:that those who don’t see things the way you currently see them are “unexcusable”?
Absolutly not
Orson, your watermelon metaphor is worthy of a response , it brings to mind my lame attempt at the chess metaphor we are esentially saying the same thing. I am the first to point out the good in the church when deserved on this issue I am sensitive and will not back down . As I said I am from mixed blood myself and despite the fact that my Fathers blood would not have prevented me from holding the priesthood it still feels personal . I feel I have presented the facts as they are and have demonstrated clearly that not enough has been done to correct the errors of our past. You ask what can agnologing that do ? We are on the same team but do not see eye to eye on how to help the disaffected and perhaps eachother . Some people will be drawn to your appraoch i’m sure others will be drawn to mine . But to answer your question Well for starters agnologing that the cannon has racists elements is not the same things as throwing away the whole watermelon it is simply agnologing that fact . I have no golden cows and I simple call it like I see it. Many people myself included come to these forums so that we don’t feel we are losing our minds, agnologing and exploring here what we cannot agnology and explore elsewhere is a important step to reclaiming and developing our personal faith . This is something that simply cannot be achieved by saying well its not really so bad is it. I would rather explore these feelings in a safe controlled enviroment with others trying to stay active than in other forums were this is not the goal . We don’t have to agree on all things but the excuses , rationalizations and philosophical reflections on this particular topic turn my stomach. It is against everything I stand for and I can not excuse the unexcusable. On a larger scale I believe the dissafected in this church can be agents for change, It is one of the reasons I stay . I believe the members of this church have more power to change than they give themselves credit for . But first we must talk
Orson, ok I’ll try to take a stab at this one, In the LDS community a temple recomend symbolizes your worthiness before God , I think it is a self defeating attitude to not include yourself among the worthy and remain active in the church. This is MY OWN personal view and based on what I view the symbol of temple to be. I don’t personally know you but you strike me as a man who is sincere in his religion and trying his best to account himself worthy before God. So my question is can you stand in a building symbolic of God’s presence and say “i’m trying the best I can , the best I know how ” ? If your answer is yes then the God that I believe in would have know objection to attending the Temple. As far as your TR interview goes its a personal and symbolic event , I try to keep mine personal and symbolic , I suggest you do the same . Also it has been my experience that moving forward and reclaiming your personal faith is a bit like getting in cold pool , it is easiest just to jump in . Good-luck I hope something I said was helpful.
Salo
Old-Timer wrote:Oh, and to the issue of it still being in our canon, I don’t think it is. When you look at the verses in the Book of Mormon that generally are quoted and read them figuratively
Yes Ray , will have to expalin for himself what was ment here. This was what I was responding to when I said
Salo wrote:I find it intresting that you would admit that our prophets can be faillible but not concide that our sacred books written by prophets can be.
I actually agree will Ray in that the skin cursings are best looked at as figuratively. If I was in Sunday school this is the appraoch that I would take. After all I feel the whole BOM is best taken figuratively. But we are not in Church right now . What I was objecting to is that this is what the church teaches in regards to skin cursings and that the BOM was originally intented to be figurative in regards to skin cursings . When the church has its back against the wall it usally blames its members for misunderstanding or not being worthy, etc. It never takes full responsibilty for its actions it diverts and blames.
Now in regards to lamanite skin cursings the scripture is clear and has always been understood not as figurative but literal. Consider that all things in the church have to be approved by the 1st pres. including all pictures used in class and in manuals and art hanging in the buildings . I have always seen lamanites portrayed as having dark skin and nephites having white skin. People see these church appraoved images all the time as we do in church movies who use real not figurative dark skined people to portray lamanites and real not figurative white people to portray nephites. Everyone understands this and all these materials are approved by the church. When I asked my bishop about skin cursings he believed it to be literal but admitted he struggled to understand it. This is the same as every other believing member I have ever talked to . Is this the failure of the members to comprehed what is being taught them or is something else ? If the members don’t understand at what point do the leaders take responsibility ? Even if the lamanites curse is to be understood figuratively to teach it useing the symbols of real dark skinned people is problematic to me which is why I will make no attempt to candy coat this teaching. It is what it is, and I stand by cultural influence being the most logical reason for racist elements in our cannon and that they are still there. I stand by that I have not imagined this or misunderstood this teaching. People struggle all the time trying to fit the churches past and present errors into there heads consider polygamy yes we don’t teach it anymore and we all seem to agree it is not what it claims to be, however not focusing on it dosen’t change the content of D&C 132 nor does it change the fact that many men continue to be sealed to more than one woman . This practise has implications for the next life . My TBM wife is scared to death she will have to practice the principal in the next life. Is this her fault as well for not understanding ? MY point we as a church do not address its errors in a very good way we just try to pretend it didn’t happen or that it is all fixed by not focussing on it . Skin cursings and the ban still have very real effects on people as do the teachings on pre earth life . My points about the white ideal shown to us in the temple is valid as are the points of the living ideal we see in the church leadership of white educate men privileged to be born in the church and in the right areas of the world. Even our teaching that we are a chosen people reserved to come forth at this time can affect how we view others. But it is not nice to confront the errors in our history,doctrine or cultural practises it is a bit like when you find out your Dad isn’t perfect. To be honest I sometimes wonder if I am in the right place because to be frank as devoted as I am to the church I simply cannot and will not bury my head in the sand on these issues . MY message is that the church has not done enough to fix this past error and frankly i’m shocked no one else has expresssed this .Often I find people are trying so hard to not be critical of church and to make it work for them , that these forums just become apologist sites . This is not aimed at anyone in particular i’m just just feeling a little frustrated.
Also Ray you said something that intrested me , something to the effect that if the ban was lifted sooner it would have not had the effect amongst church leadership as it did in 1978 . Please explain this further . I have a deep respect for men like David O mcKay and Hugh B Brown for there work in lfting the ban and am only vaugley aware of the in fighting on this issue as I understand it Joseph Feilding Smith and Harold B Lee were the hold outs but you caught my attention. I should tell you up front I feel it may have looked like folding to political pressures if they did lift then back then , but I feel it ended up looking like they were being dragged out of the stone age. Also you said that no one disputed JS ordained Blacks it was disputed in the book I read as I said. I asked because I thought it may have been rhetoric to justify the ban . Do you know for sure Elijah Able was visibly black and that there were others that JS knew of ?
Ray, thanks for your thoughts I always enjoy hearing what people have to say that lived threw the ban . I was 5 years old when the ban was lifted so I appreciate hearing from someone who was there. Many my age are not aware of the details of racism in LDS history so the purpose of my initial post was to make clear what was being taught and and practiced prior to 1978. I hope that I represented the time in a correct way. Your reponse to me focused mainly on the ban, in my post I tried to cover a little more ground as I found out the justifications for the ban with premortal existence turned out to be more ugly than I had assumed before I looked into it. I would like to state my case now. First of all you should know that the scripture that I quoted from 2 Nephi 5:21and the teaching of skin cursings in the BOM is one of my strongests evidences against the historicity of the BOM . I am not talking DNA here i’m am talking as you say the heart believes what it wants to believe and I to would rather be wrong on this side than right on the other, you may find this foolish I really don’t know. I am aware that you know this but I feel the need to state it here in saying that it is not a admission of lack of faith in the gospel. We can look at the game of chess it has racist elements to it as, it does sexists ones . There is a reason white always goes first , as there is that the most powerful player on the board is male and cannot be killed. Does this take away from the beauty of the game NO it is a beloved game all around the world and what some people can do with the game blows my mind. I can honestly say the same thing with the LDS cannon and maintain that is has racist passages and other human elements.
Now I will concede, that JS had a fairly forward thinking policy on Black people for a man of his time
” they have souls, and are subjects to salvation . Go into Cincinnati or any other city , and find an educated Negro, who rides in his carriage , and you will see a man who has risen by his own mind to his exahlated state of respectability. The slaves in Washington are more refined than many in high places, …….”
We could also talk about his campain platform of freeing the slaves .But that does not mean he was a man without his own cultural influences. The way I see it America was trying to justify treating Black people as worse than second class citizen at the time of the restoration . Further America was busy stealing Native land and pushing them into the territories. People needed a reason that this was ok, and it was a common belief that Black people bore the mark of cain to justify such actions . Natives weren’t even entitled to such a justification as they were seen as savages. We seem to be on agreement on this point.
I find it intresting that you would admit that our prophets can be faillible but not concide that our sacred books written by prophets can be. I quoted some scriptures and I think I have been in the church long enough to know exactly what it is teaching in those passages. The Bom clearly teaches skin cursings it is a offensive teaching and it is very convenient to turn around after 100 plus years and say it was figurative and all a big misunderstanding. I failed to mention 1 Nephi 19:14 and 3 Nephi 16:9 that refers to the jewish people becoming a hiss and a byword again I know how to read and know what was ment here. The scripture you pointed to does point out one of the many paradoxes in the BOM , I don’t mind that they are there they force you to think but I don’t like it when people try to deny that they exisit .The line between doctrine and culture is very thin in this church as we all know and In a church were the leaders word is as good as the word of God they must take responsibillity for what they say and have said .
I find the easiest expalination to these racist elements being in our cannon the 18 century influence. I look at the BoA and BoMoses having these influences in part perhaps subconciencely to try to stop the blood from spilling in Missouri .I’m glad you have found a suitable explanation to these problems ( believe me when I say I tried ) but many cannot and are forced to the same conclusion that I was forced to make. Again this is does not take away from the good in these book to me.
Now I asked if we have done enough it has been 40 years since the civil rights movement and 30 years since the ban was lifted yet the 1st presidency and the 12 is as pale as it was in 1830 that is a fact , I don’t even know if we have a Black GA ? When I go to the temple the video clearly depicts only white and delightsome people that is a fact . My point our spiritual ideal has shifted from white working class to white rich and old . For a world wide church with our track record this is simply not enough IMO.
The scriptures I used in Moses about the premortal life clearly talks of noble and great ones becoming our leaders it is now generally understood to mean the brethern. Meaning they were rewarded with those spots for there performance in the pre mortal existence . Which means what ? Logic tells us if they were rewarded then others were not so the idea of us being born equal is out the window . The spiritual ideal I spoke of earlier being white and rich filters down from the top of the church to the bottom and many local leadership reflects the ideal portayed at the top weather deserved or not .Most of the time a good education is seen as a prerequisite to leadership in the church to many getting a good education means being born into a family and location were that is a possiblity . It may not be a ban but I find it elitist.
AS for BRM quote if i’m being honest here he sounds like a politician who just lost, throwing his support behind his oppponent after defeat. Yes I agree in this theology the current leaders position trumps the past leaders but we still have a long way to go. Also by that rational the future leaders teachings will trump the current for better and for worse . I try to put my faith in that it will be for the better.
