One of my Mormon relatives posted this on FB:

http://janariess.religionnews.com/2015/03/19/african-american-mormon-convert-lds-church-needs-make-amends-past-racism/

"From the first time I learned of the priesthood/temple ban, I knew without a doubt that no part of the policy was from God..... when the Church issued the Race and the Priesthood essay on December 13, 2013, as part of its series on Gospel Topics, that essay simply confirmed what I already knew – that racism was the only reason for the ban."

hope this goes viral...

Does she realize that they also need to make amends to the women? So far, they haven't even written a "hidden" essay on that topic.

They still discriminate against the women no matter what color they are. As a RSP she should see this as plain as day.

they can't get around the "Book Of Mormon." The Brethren have few options -- either they have another "revelation" and make corrections to the "BoM" narrative and thus change "the most correct book on Earth" or just let it die over the next few years until it is no longer official scripture. Either course has its difficulties...they are really between Scylla and Charybdis on this one.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/20/2015 12:33AM by anybody.

No mention of the BoM? The cornerstone of the religion?

I'm glad she called them out on their anonymous essay.

I always wonder why African Americans would ever join the church, especially women. Haven't they had enough discrimination?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/20/2015 01:35AM by anybody.

...the Book of Moses and the Book of Abraham include similar dogma about dark skin being a curse from God as well. And all of those books were produced by the same man who taught that Negroes were cursed, and therefore couldn't hold the priesthood. For the church to rid itself of all racism, they have to dump all of those books. They can't just edit the racist portions out; a major premise of the BOM is the part where God separates the Lamanites from the Nephites by turning their skins dark so they wouldn't "be enticing" to the Nephites. That storyline is so essential to the BOM that editing it would destroy the entire book.

True, for example, in McConkie's "Mormon Doctrine," he justifies the curse with lots of scriptures -- the most specific being from the BofA. So, the church may blame it on past "those were the times" racism, but the scriptures they used to justify it are still there....

'make amends'?

I don't know that we teach that (for leaders)...

The essays are just the first part of "inoculating" the masses. The second part believe it or not was the movie "Meet the Mormons".

Imagine you're a Mormon born and raised in Lehi, UT all your life. Then told to go watch "Meet the Mormons". This movie was not made for the gentile or for real people who live in real societies, this movie was made for Mormons. Suddenly the only White, married priesthood holder is the candy delivery man. The rest were single mom, latino/latina couple where the woman is a professional kickboxer, the African-American Bishop in the South, David Archuleta doing the sound track.

They're trying to get the apology snuck in under the radar, but those pesky gays and women keep showing up pointing fingers at other social injustices. If they fold under the pressure for Black Mormons, the leaders are actually VERY, VERY afraid that women and gays will also want apologies and full membership.

GOOD. It's about time the leaders were living in fear.

The spirit tells me that there will be another high profile excommunication soon.

I can't fathom the reason any black person would join the cult. As I see it, a black person who joins the CULT might as well join the KKK too (they are very similar).

I have known some people (often women) who think that they don't deserve to have a decent man around to be with. They are on some kind of self destructive mission.
Black people who join the cult are also punishing themselves for some reason or don't believe that they deserve a church that loves them.

Would a black member please let us know why you are in a cult that thinks you are inferior? Why would you want to stay in it?

The CULT will NEVER make amends for anything so don't hold your breath waiting.
There are so many spiritual paths, why anyone would choose the cult must be to punish themselves for some reason.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/20/2015 01:54AM by verilyverily.

"Would a black member please let us know why you are in a cult that thinks you are inferior? Why would you want to stay in it?"

Exactly, especially considering the fact that this woman's position is that the priesthood ban was solely the product of early church leaders' racist myths of their era. Since church dogma asserts that the prophet can never lead the people astray in matters of doctrine---and this woman recognizes that that is false---then you'd think that she'd take the next logical step and leave the church.

One of the biggest "selling points" of Mormonism is that it has a "living prophet" to receive revelation/inspiration from God on a regular basis. If the priesthood ban was solely because of ordinary men and their prejudices, and that ban continued from the 1840s to 1978, then obviously, Mormon prophets are not receiving any inspiration from God.

Black people are no different than anyone else. So, if the LDS religious message or "Happy Family" image of The Church™ (insert North Korean propaganda poster here) appeals to you, you are going to join. Every institution in America has had some sort of racial discriminatory practice -- in the past or present. If they hear about Brigham Young condemning people to death for interracial sex or Jane Manning being forbidden to enter the Temple or going to heaven as a slave, they will put it in the same racist past context. If the people around them are not racist, they'll feel comfortable enough to stay. If they face subtle or hidden racism, they'll leave.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/20/2015 12:00PM by anybody.

"Every institution in America has had some sort of racial discriminatory practice -- in the past or present."

True, but not every institution in America claims to be the one true religion, and to receive direct revelation from God.

"If they hear about Brigham Young condemning people to death for interracial sex or Jane Manning being forbidden to enter the Temple or going to heaven as a slave, they will put it in the same racist past context."

But by doing that, they concede that 19th-century church leaders were just as susceptible to the same human faults and prejudices as everybody else, and that the church's claims that the leaders would never lead the church astray are false. The old temple endowment ceremony script said that false religions taught "the philosophies of men, mingled with scripture." The restoration of the true gospel through Joseph Smith was supposed to prevent that problem.

It's worse than that. Brigham Young mentioned his prophetic
standing when saying that Blacks were descendents of Cain:

"If there never was a prophet, or apostle of Jesus Christ spoke
it before, I tell you, this people that are commonly called
negroes are the children of old Cain. I know they are, I know
that they cannot bear rule in the preisthood, for the curse on
them was to remain upon them, until the resedue of the
posterity of Michal and his wife receive the blessings, the
seed of Cain would have received had they not been cursed; and
hold the keys of the preisthood, until the times of the
restitution shall come, and the curse be wiped off from the
earth, and from michals seed. Then Cain's seed will be had in
rememberance, and the time come when that curse should be wiped
off."
--Brigham Young, Feb 5, 1852.

To disavow it is to declare Brigham Young a false prophet. He
wasn't just "expressing an opinion, he was speaking as a
"prophet." Nine "prophets, seers and revelators" after him
continued the doctrine and associated practices for a century,
and blamed it all on God. That makes them false prophets
also. The Southern Baptists can say, "we were wrong" and
apologize (which they have done) but an organization that says,
"we are lead by Jesus Christ and our leaders are prophets of
God revealing and carrying out His will" don't have that luxury.

That's why, as Dallin Oaks recently emphasized, "the history of
the church is not to seek apologies or to give them,"



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/20/2015 01:25PM by baura.

And wouldn't the "one true church lead by gawd through direct revelation to a prophet" have been on the leading edge of the abolitionist movement like other individual Christians and churches?

Why was TSCC on the side of status quo?

Hoax: The church doesn't make apologies neither does it seek apologies.

Translated: These are not the droids you are looking for.Move along. Don't ask questions.

Boyd behind the scenes: Someone shut that woman up. I've had enough of these uppity women, and Gays, now we've got a 'coloured' one too trying to stir up trouble. We let them sit on the bus with us, they got to go to the Temple, as a Revelator i just don't see what the problem is?

I guess I just have a hard time believing that hundreds of GA's from js to kimball (and most of the other American protestant churches of the time and today) were just too racist to accept the blacks. And that ignorance is the reason for the ban? Somethings are just hard to accept especially in this age of American liberalism. No one wants to believe that a diety Christain's call God might actually favor certain people or have a chosen people?

Today's christian religion is that everyone is equal. God saves all people. God doesn't favor anyone. The old testament is all wrong. job and Moses didn't know what they were talking about.

Blacks are different than whites. I think like a conservative... Blacks are better off staying with what works for them, Mormonism is just going to bring bad news to them.

You can't just assume things about people based on race. That's like saying you have no distinct personality, idiosyncrasies or individual traits simply because you have melanin in your skin. If this lady knows the history and the doctrine and still wants to be Mormon that's her decision -- even if it's a puzzling one.


As to your first point about not simply accepting people because they are black, yes, that's how it was. Racism as we know it North America began in the late seventeenth century as a way to prevent lower class whites and blacks from combining (as would happen in Brazil) and joining forces against the landowning aristocracy (lookup Bacon's Rebellion in 1680). The British class system became a system of racial preference in the Colonies. Over time, this white favouritism evolved and merged with theories of white supremacy which viewed blacks as a lower form of life just above that of animals. Unlike ancient Rome (where slavery was based on class and conquest instead of race), in North America blacks weren't regarded as human and could be worked and bred like other beasts of burden. Associating with blacks became "unseemly" and "immoral" rather than just a class distinction of employers not socialising with the hired help. Would you have sex with a farm animal (well, a lot them did actually --their slaves were their property)? Would you marry your horse or pig? That's how they though about it.

Not all men thought this way. This man married one of his slaves and freed her.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zephaniah_Kingsley



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/20/2015 01:21PM by anybody.

This idea of racism and a dark skin signifying a "lower" more
"undesirable" caste wasn't part of ancient thought. As you
point out it is a recent addition to western culture, mostly in
the colonies and later the States.

This again shows how the Book of Mormon is not an ancient
document as it assumes its readers will accept that giving the
Lamanites a dark skin would make them not be "enticing" to the
whites. The Book of Mormon assumes, without qualification or
explanation, that a dark skin is a turn-off to whites, thus
echoing prevailing attitudes in Joseph Smith's time and place.

baura Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> This idea of racism and a dark skin signifying a
> "lower" more
> "undesirable" caste wasn't part of ancient
> thought. As you
> point out it is a recent addition to western
> culture, mostly in
> the colonies and later the States.

In india, light skin shows high caste: the brahmins were the highest caste of educated warriors and the dalits are the lowest caste with darkest skin and are 'untouchable' to other higher castes.

Even today. light skin is prized from india to pakistan and further afield. In fact, in India many rapists have been found not guilty because their caste was higher than the victim's caste - the victims primarily dalits - the lowest caste is considered untouchable and unclean by higher castes. This system is perpetuated because of the hindi belief in reincarnation: each soul will live a life in each of the castes at some point. So this justifies their treatment of others.

'K, I haven't been everywhere in India, but I've met some dark skinned high caste people. South India is somewhat different than the Northern Plains, I suppose. It's such a big country, hard to generalize.

The corporation doesn't want them to stay "black" or to retain their culture and society. They want them to become one of them, part of their society.

3Nephi 2:15--" 15 And their curse was taken from them, and their skin became white like unto the Nephites;

The corporation's whole belief system is that everyone will become White, Heterosexual, baby factories and we'll all be the same.

everyone will become White, Heterosexual, baby factories and we'll all be the same."

Cue: Star Trek theme.

"Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Resistance is futile."

(Ew, sorry, but it's sorta right there, isn't it?!)

They will probably excommunicate her for speaking out
Against the church in
Public. Don't know why she'd want stay in a racist organization anyway.

Can you imagine the news cycles from that?

As others have stated, the really sad thing that this woman drank the Kool-Aid and believes all that First Vision, CK & "families are forever" crap that is made up and/or plagiarized just like everything else the missionaries sold her.

[[[ "I commend the Church for issuing the Race and the Priesthood essay, but I do not believe it has done nearly enough to rid itself of the stain of exclusionary practices of the past. Here is what I wish the Church would do:

-Issue the Race and the Priesthood essay as a letter from the First Presidency, an Official Declaration, or a proclamation.

-Have that official document translated into all the languages that the Church uses to communicate with its worldwide membership.

-Read it at General Conference and make it clear that neither the ban nor the justifications for the ban came from God.

-Direct that it be read from the pulpit in every ward, branch, “cluster” (see here), and mission in the world.

-Incorporate it into all levels of the Church’s curriculum and teachings."

- See more at: http://janariess.religionnews.com/2015/03/19/african-american-mormon-convert-lds-church-needs-make-amends-past-racism/#sthash.HZMOHBhq.dpuf]]]

###

I'm quite afraid you're gonna be waitin' a very long time for any of that to happen Girlfriend!

Or so it seems to me...

This woman is supposed to be "white"
http://mdbelleza.com/files/2012/07/2bronceado.jpeg

This woman is supposed to be "black"
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRl5Qxx3jeYl-zmBmu_2J87c5qdbIdPDdGDGQKPMN2n6E5JRCF1

Is there actually any difference?
Really?
Ya think?

"High Yellow" and "swarthy." A light black vs a dark white. It illustrates the silliness of race classification and labelling. Google "Jay Smooth."

In all the talk about the (CLAIMED) PH being denied to black men, it's seldom mentioned that black women couldn't go to the temple; therefore, I believe none served missions prior to the implementation of the (CLAIMED) revelation of 1978.

What EXACTLY was the basis for that, Mr. Monson?