vanilla, I think it was likely that it was a misunderstanding. We LDS don’t think we’re the only ones who can pray over someone. There are numerous promises made in scripture to anyone who has faith in Christ, without respect of church. We do believe that only the LDS church has authority to exercise the priesthood. It’s quite possible that either the conversation was confused, or the young missionary was.
What the missionary might have been thinking is a blessing (laying on of hands) invoking the authority of the priesthood (like the authority that Jesus gave the Apostles to heal the sick, cast out demons, etc.).
It is also possible that the missionary was simply wrong. There are a lot of Urban Legends out there, both in and out of Mormonism, and I heard a number of doozies. I eventually learned to be skeptical of most of them, but I did get taken in for a while (someone being healed by the power of Satan was one that I’d heard). Keep in mind that missionaries are between 19-21 years old usually, and hence have at most 2 years experience. Furthermore, they only have a few weeks formal training, and that training really focuses on basic doctrine and the formal discussions they persent to potential converts. Going outside that basic instruction means that the amount of knowledge and scriptural mastery will vary wildly from one missionary to the next.
What missionaries do carry is testimony of their own spiritual witnesses. That is their most important message. The church tries to teach them as much as possible, but in the end conversion relies on the convert reading scripture and praying to find out for himself (or herself) the veracity of the message. Hence there isn’t much formal effort to train outside of that. There is an emphasis on personal scripture study, but that’s really left to the individual missionary and missionary companionship.
I dunno if it was a misunderstanding or not. The guy in church prayed over my son, layed hands on his head, and annointed him with oil, and he WAS healed.
With LDS authority but authority that ALL believers have, Mormon or not.
Even my finacee said it was done by satan to keep me believing in the wrong church.
First off, I do think that it is reasonable for me to assume that someone would be proud of having a famous or esteemed parent, grandparent, whatever. I would assume that people would make a point of documenting the offspring of an esteemed person. People tend to like to point out that they are decendants of President Hoover, or whatnot. Why would I not think that the Mormon church, who is so big on genealogy, would not bother to adequately document the offspring of the church’s founder, Joseph Smith?
Uh huh. More power to ya. As I mentioned before, I am not trying to convince you that some of the things you believe are false, or that other things are true. I am just pointing out that there are differing accounts regarding the history of Mormonism.
So, you don’t, but obviously someone does. That’s what I’ve been trying to establish. That there are differing opinions about certain historical events in the Mormon church. You believe that these accounts are lies, and you may be correct. But still, they are out there. People feel strongly about this.
Yes, granted. But if a source came from an official LDS page, that would be OK, right? But if a source comes from a RLDS page, or an anti-Mormon page, that’s not OK, and suspect. Right? I’m just giving you a hard time, forgive me.
But I’d like to know, why would there be any such document in Times and Seasons, where JS and HS kicked that guy out for practicing polygamy? I don’t get it. Why would they do that? I don’t see how the wording is that vague. They kicked a guy out, and denounced polygamy, and yet they believed it was OK secretly! No, I don’t get it at all. And I’m sure I would not be the only one.
I think I can drum up some original sources myself, probably from non-LDS books. I do not know if that will satisfy you as being “well documented” or “well researched”, however, since they will be non-LDS! (I’m just giving you a hard time again.) I’ll be working on that. But my point here is not to try to convince you or any other Mormon that your beliefs are incorrect. I’ve stated that before. My point is to illustrate that there are differing opinions on this issue. The LDS church has Brigham Young, Joseph’s other wives, etc. to testify that polygamy existed. The RLDS church has Joseph’s widow, mother, son, and others, insisting that it did not. Who are we to believe? It was so long ago, what if some documents were tampered with, and falsified? I’m sure either side could have strong motivations to do so, when you come down to it. Someone is lying - both sides can’t be telling the truth. Who are we to believe? I’m not trying to convince you that Brigham Young lied, believe me. I see you are strong in your beliefs. I’m just pointing out that some parts of Mormon history could be said to appear hazy, especially for people not affiliated with the church.
This is what I pointed out above. The descendants of JS might be interested in their lineage, but there’s little reason why the LDS church as a body would be interested. Yes, the church places a good deal of emphasis on genealogy, but it’s on the individuals doing the genealogy, to find out their ancestors and to perform proxy ordinances for them. The church as a body is not interested in the specifics of the genealogy of the individual.
A side note about descendants of Smith is somthing that Gracia N. Jones pointed out that I neglected to mention. She said that she’d always known she was a descendant of someone named Joseph Smith, but her parents warned her not to talk about it out of fear. Her mother had actually suffered teasing, etc. because of it–I think it’s only more recently that old prejudices have begun to come down (Jones says she converted to the church some time at age 18, in the early 50’s). Maybe we’ll have more documentation about Smith’s descendants at some point in the future.
Perhaps I sounded a bit preachy. My point was that the mission of the church is unaffected by this issue. I’m fully aware that there are differing and conflicting accounts. If that weren’t the case, there wouldn’t be so much controversy about it, I’d imagine.
(this about the Tanners)
The Tanners have been criticized for their methods by LDS and non-LDS alike. I have seen several examples of their research being outright provable lies and distortions (for example, upon looking up the sources they cite, a quote here or there means something totally different in context than how they attempt to present it). I invite you to pick up some of the Tanners’ work and check their sources. You’d find out the same thing I did. I realize that poeple disagree about LDS history, etc., but the Tanners have been proven to be factually incorrect, and have been criticized for their research. If someone tells you that 2+2=5, that’s not disagreement, it’s simply wrong. There are more objective sources than the Tanners. The recent “Encyclopedia of Mormonism,” though there was some collaboration with Mormon leaders, is in fact an independent effort to describe the LDS church, and aspects of its history. You might be interested in looking at that.
I realize that the RLDS church (side note: they’re not actually called that anymore–they changed their name recently to “The Community of Christ”, effective some time after Jan 1, 2001-see http://www.bergen.com/morenews/latter09200004098.htm for more details) disagrees with me on JS’ polygamy. I have no argument with that. I was under the impression that the thread was about what LDS people believe, and I responded as such. If your entire point is that people disagree with me, then I’m not disagreeing with that, and I don’t think it’s necessary to belabor the point any more. I believe that they’re wrong (RLDS that is), and I’ve shown the documentation I’ve found that has led me to conclude such. You’re also welcome to verify the sources and research.
They didn’t kick him out for practicing polygamy. They kicked him out for preaching polygamy. At the time every positive testimony indicates that it was not an open thing, and that polygamous marriages were only entered at the direction of the church leaders. Having this fellow running around preaching it was contrary to the program at the time. If they asked him to stop and he didn’t, then it was completely logical to “kick him out.” The exact quote is:
(I verified the quote with my CD copy of Times and Seasons)
The word “other” could imply that polygamy was a “false and corrupt doctrine” or not. It’s ambiguous. In the later quote,
The full text continues as follows:
It is clear then that the “other doctrines” were speculation about councils of heaven, etc. Futhermore, the denial reads not as a condemnation of polygamy, but of the idea that, “a man having a certain priesthood, may have as many wives as he pleases”–that was certainly not what Joseph taught according to the corroborating witnesses. He taught that the wives had to be given to him by God. It appears in fact that several attempts were made to “deny polygamy” without really denying it, which also matches what the people Joseph knew most intimately said. I’m not saying that mine is the only possible interpretation. Certainly I feel mine has the most weight beind it (otherwise why would I believe it ).
You’ll note that I condemn webpages as sources unilaterally. I didn’t make exception for LDS or non-LDS pages. The difference between good research and bad research has much to do with actually citing sources that your readers can refer to.
I agree that there are some issues in history (in general) in which we’ll probably never know exactly what happened, and this appears to be one of them. It does seem unlikely that a near-death interview with Emma Smith (in which she made other factual errors–specifically about how many children she had who died), or the memories of Joseph Smith III (who was young when JS was killed) are the best of sources. I didn’t see any references to Lucy Mack Smith, but I may have missed it. I think at this point, if you wish to continue the conversation, it’d be best to do so by email. One of my email addresses is posted on my profile, and I’d welcome further conversation there. I think if there are other issues poeple have, it’d be best to wind down this part of the thread.
In fact this is the Tanners’ modus operandi. If anyone is interested I’d be happy to post quote after quote they’ve abused, misused and taken out of context.
The Tanners are quite adept at the use of ellipses ("…") to excise source material that doesn’t support their thesis.
I give them credit for being the most well-read anti-Mormons (and that’s saying a lot), but they habitually do violence to their sources.
Actually they used to disagree. The modern leadership (late 1960’s on) has more or less succumbed to the overwhelming evidence that JS taught and practiced plural marriage. But they don’t much care anymore, as they’ve tried to distance themselves from historic “Mormonism” and identify more with mainline Protestantism.
The RLDS Restoration Branch movement, however, still does not accept JS as teaching or living plural marriage.
emarkp, that’s fine, we don’t need to belabour this issue forever.
Yes, I’m glad you understand - I was not trying to convince you that your beliefs are incorrect. I was just trying to point out that to an outsider, things are not so cut-and-dried. And there is not a small amount of controversy or difference of opinion in this issue. I do not claim that the links I dredged up were all accurate. I take your word that the Tanners are not to be believed - I hadn’t heard of them, one way or another. But - I do believe that people are bound to be confused, with JS’s son, widow and mother, among others, denying what others in the church claim to be true. It’s an unusual thing, I think, to have people so close to Joseph Smith (his family) deny these things. It’s human nature to believe family members’ accounts of such personal things, or at least to take them into consideration. That’s why this is a confusing issue for me.
So, I still have questions, and feel that certain things are a bit blurry. But that’s enough for me for now - it’s someone else’s turn to ask questions!
I am curious about the baptism of the dead. I heard that LDS members had been baptizing Jewish victims of the holocaust and that Israel had demanded a stop to this practice. Anyone know anything about this?
Personally, I like the LDS tendency to research family histories as it helps me in my personal genealogy!
It’s true that a few years ago, a small group of people were sending names of Holocaust victims in to be baptized for the dead. Jewish groups got annoyed, and they were asked to quit.
The LDS Church has always taught that you’re only supposed to be submitting your own family’s names for baptism, but on the other hand, they don’t check to make sure that you’re not sending in others’ names as well–who has the time or omniscience to do that?
(OT)In general, there’s not much point in sending in famous names (like royalty)–they’ve probably already been done multiple times, since it’s so easy to find out their names. (/OT)
I can see both sides’ viewpoints–from the Mormon folks’ point of view, they’re doing a nice thing for semi-cousins in the faith who were basically martyred and who deserve to be able to progress in knowledge of the gospel as soon as possible. Whereas the Jews are horrified by what they perceive as a betrayal of their faith by some ignernt idjits ™ in Utah.
I should add that LDS belief is that a person who has been baptized by proxy is free to accept or reject the baptism --it simply offers the opportunity for the person to progress and be taught the gospel. We eventually expect to do this for every person who has ever lived, so that everyone has equal opportunity to be taught.
This topic of post-death baptism has been debated on this bb before at some length (and with some heat!) The question of the baptism of the Jews killed in the Holocaust is quite interesting. The World Congress of Jews asked the Mormons to stop post-death baptisms of Jewish victims of the holocaust. The mormons agreed. Later it was found that they had continued the practice. The World Jewish Congress again asked them to cease. They agreed. There is still some question as to whether this practice has continued. As far as I know, there is no way to keep the mormons from baptizing you after you die, regardless of your personal religious beliefs or your personal feelings about the matter.
Again, I am going to relate the story of my family–even though I know I will be accused of lying about it by Monty, whom I do not know and who has no knowledge of my family in any way shape or form. My grandfather was dying in 1973. He had a friend, a Mr. Woods, who came to see him in the hospital. Mr. Woods and his wife were there with my grandmother in the room. My grandmother told me that my grandfather was baptized by these mormons prior to his death. The entire process made my grandfather furious, but he could not stop them as he was so weak. My grandmother said he was extremely relieved to see the Episcopal minister later–I assume he felt that he hadn’t been shoved off into a church not of his choosing. I have no idea why my grandmother did not stop them, but she had always been a people-pleaser and probably just didn’t want to cause a scene. My grandfather had been baptized into the Episcopal church as a baby and sent his wife and children there regularly, although he did not attend. I feel that his so-called friends denied him his chance for a death with peace and dignity. It was several years later that I found out from two mormon missionaries (young women of all things!) that the process must not have been a baptism but an annointment with oil as a blessing. Regardless, I feel it was such an affront on freedom of religion, as well as a personal cruelty to someone that I loved very dearly, that I have never forgiven the mormon church and probably never will. I was not present at the happening and was not an eye witness, but I trust my grandmother’s version of what happened as I remember her telling it to me. My understanding of what happened during this even has changed as I learned more about mormons and their beliefs and practices. There is no reason for my grandmother to make up this story as she had a daughter, my aunt, who was a member of the mormon church (her husband was even a bishop or at least he was until he set up his 17 year old mistress with her own apartment and his wife found out). I didn’t make it up either–who’d want to think such an awful thing happened to someone you love?
Anyway, post-death baptisms seem to be cruicial to mormon religious practice. It seems to me to be a clear violation of one’s freedom of religion but apparently, mormons feel that they have to right to do this to anyone as part of THEIR religious freedom.
P.S. I think the Tanners are much more reliable than the souces from the Mormon church. The mormon church is famous for its coverup of early documents, and its revisions of the BOM, D&C, and other church documents. It’s definitely an evolutionary religion. Basically, as I understand it, (and correct me if I am wrong) the current Mormon beliefs can be changed at any point by the current living prophet. His interpretations of current history and doctrine are supposedly infallible–that is until the next prophet changes them.
smilingjaws, there is no reason to doubt that the Mormon friends gave your grandfather a blessing. But it was NOT a baptism. We believe in full immersion of baptism. So unless they lifted him from the hospital, found a font or a river, and dunked him in w/o being stopped, then your grandfather was not baptized.
And I repeat, for about the billionth time. The spirit of the dead person who was baptized CAN CHOOSE WHETHER OR NOT TO ACCEPT IT!
[sarcasm] Ah, but pepperlandgirl, the LDS don’t really believe what the LDS teach. The LDS only believe what the anti-Mormons teach that the LDS believe! Sheesh. [/sarcasm]
Pepperland girl, I know this is pissing into the wind, but the point of my story is NOT whether or not my grandfather was blessed or baptized (I believe he was annointed with oil intended to be some sort of blessing,) but that it was done against his will. I have heard all the arguments intended to minimize the insult of being so treated without one’s consent, and I find them patronizing, offensive, and self-promoting.
After reading the various arguments promoted by Mormons on this board (many well-meaning and “nice” people–and a complete jerk or two) I know Mormons simply do not have the capacity to understand that even baptisim by proxy is offensive to many people who value their own religious freedom. I don’t think it is possible for you to get beyond the concept that supposedly the dead person accepts or rejects this belief and thus it doesn’t matter what is done on earth. I wish you people could understand that to some of us it does matter and we wish that you would have the decency to honor our wishes about using our names and the names of our loved ones in a practice we consider a direct contravention of our right to religious liberty.
Also, I wish you could understand how terribly important it is to some of us to treat our dead with respect–even to the extent of not putting the need of the Mormons to “give the dead the opportunity for salvation” over the rights of people (such as the victims of the Holocaust) to religious self-determination. I guess those of us who object to this practice are supposed to say, “Well, it doesn’t matter to the dead person and it makes the Mormons happy, so let them carry on with their little practice of baptizing the dead. In fact, to make the Mormons happy, we’ll even let them annoint living, incapacitated people with oil regardless of the personal religious convictions of the victim.” I know that to expect this of Mormons (even the sweet, innocent, good-hearted ones) is totally hopeless, but at least I tried.
Thanks for providing the information on this question and answer session. I have three questions more for you, if you care to answer them: How often are you expected to visit other people within your stake? What do you do during these home visits? And, who is mentioned most often in Sunday lessons–Jesus Christ or Joseph Smith?
Visiting Home teachers are required to visit once a month, at the beginning.
Jesus Christ is mentioned more. If you had a real question, notice how the name of the church is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
Actually the name is correctly written “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” Note the capital T (even in the middle of a sentence), and the hyphenation and case on “Latter-day”.
The hyphenation and case issue has changed over time. Originally it was “Latter Day.” The RLDS still spell it that way.
smilingjaws, I’m terribly sorry that this annointing took place without your grandfather’s permission or the permission of his family. If the situation occurred as you describe, these Latter-day Saints were acting contrary to Church instruction, regardless of the purity of their motiviations.
The Church Handbook of Instructions, the main manual for LDS Church leaders, says:
“[Priesthood holders] should administer to the sick [i.e. annoint with oil and bless] at the request of the sick person or of someone who is vitally concerned so the blessing will be according to their faith (see D&C 24:13-14; 42:43-44, 48-52). Melchizedek Priesthood holders who visit hospitals should not solicit opportunities to administer to the sick.” (1998 edition, page 30)
It is a fundamental practice of ours NOT to perform a Priesthood blessing without the permission of the person receiving the blessing, or, if that person is incapable of making such a choice, their closest relative (usually a spouse, parent, child, etc.).
Again, my apologies. These men were probably not as well acquainted with proper LDS practice as they should have been.
Each Melchizedek Priesthood holder is assigned to “home teach” one or more families (e.g., I currently have four). Often the assignments are given to two men as a “companionship” that would home teach together. The expectation is that man (or men) will visit each family once a month, deliver a brief spiritual thought, help or offer to help the family with any temporal needs they might have, and leave with a prayer. The visit typically lasts an hour (although there are no written time restrictions).
This depends entirely on the subject of the lesson. If the study is of the New Testament or the Book of Mormon, certainly Jesus Christ. If the lesson topic is on Church history, Joseph Smith (or other Church historical figures) might get more mention in that lesson.
Keep in mind that every LDS meeting begins and ends with prayers evoked in the name of Jesus Christ. Every Sunday worship meeting includes the administration of the sacrament (what some would call communion), signifying the body and blood of Jesus Christ. Every ordinance (or sacrament), from baptism to the temple rituals, is done in the name of Christ. In fact, Joseph Smith’s name is not mentioned in ANY ordinance, inside or outside of the temple.
If your underlying question is “do Latter-day Saints place Joseph Smith equal to or near the Savior”, the answer is an affirmative NO. While we respect Joseph Smith and the work he accomplished, his life and role is nowhere near that of Jesus Christ. Joseph Smith did not create the earth. He was not born of a virgin. He did not atone for our sins on a cross. He was not resurrected. He will not be the final judge of mankind. In short, Joseph Smith is not our Lord. Jesus Christ is.
I hope this answers your questions. Please let me know if I can clarify anything for you.
So what? I mean, if we’re going to pay lip service to respecting everyone’s religious beliefs, shouldn’t we respect the fact that someone who chose not to become an LDS member in life might not appreciate being made part of one of their ceremonies in death? If God wants them to convert, I’m sure he’ll contact them after death on his own. He’s a big boy.
Phil, God does want them to convert. That’s why we have to baptize them by proxy. There are a lot of things one has to do to reach the highest kingdom, including baptism and Temple endowments. So, it’s our responsibility to make sure everybody has a chance to have those things.
Well, that’s your belief, sure, and nobody can really stop you from practicing it. However, baptising someone without their consent, even if they are dead, is arrogant, presumptious, an affront to the memory of the decedant, disrespectful to the remaining family, and ultimately no better than having someone knock on your door to try personally delivering their creed to you. Except the LDS thinks that particular practice is okay too right?
Personally, I am an atheist, so from a practical standpoint, I don’t think it matters what rites they do. They can consecrate me anytime you like, living or dead and I think it makes no real difference. But, one fundamental principle that most people in this part of the world, myself included, do agree on is that of religious self-determination. These LDS baptism rituals flaunt such self-determination, even with your stated belief that someone may choose to reject Jesus in the afterlife, for they still cannot prevent the performance of the ritual itself.
I find it impossible to respect a system that would hinge so important a matter-- the disposition of one’s eternal soul-- on whether or not an earthly ritual is performed. Apparently you think that all other things being equal, the baptism is what gets you the first class ticket? The stance of the church here is that human intervention is a key component of salvation? What about those poor souls who die without coming to the notice of the LDS church? Tough noogies on them I guess.
pldennison, the point of proxy baptism isn’t to force someone into the water. It’s to fulfill a commandment given in John 3:5 and elsewhere. It’s not paying lip service. Those who have died have gone through arguably the biggest life change possible :). Now, if they do accept the message of the Gospel on the other side, they must receive baptism to complete receive remission of their sins. We don’t believe that anyone who rejected the Gospel message here will accept it there (the so-called “second chance theory”), but that that all will have the chance to hear the message and accept or reject it. Hence those who reject it in the afterlife will have their beliefs respected.
Since we don’t know who has accepted the message, we must perform baptisms for all who have passed on. We are urged by the LDS leaders to search out our family history and then perform the ordinances for them. We do believe that the time will come (after the Second Coming of Christ) that we will have better communication between this life and the next, and hence will be able to perform only the ordinances that have been accepted. Until then, we’re a bit in the dark–yet that’s no excuse not to do anything.
As for the doctrine, some find it strange, others find it to be a merciful gift from God which helps both those who have passed away and those who are in this life, fulfilling the promise from the Old Testament that the hearts of the children would be turned to the fathers and the hearts of the fathers to the children.
Since at no point are we forcing anyone to do anything, the people who complain about it must be more concerned about their own sentiments than those of their departed. After all, if they feel their departed would reject the offering, why do they care? If they don’t believe in an afterlife at all, why does it matter?
As for Ptahlis,
I don’t see how sharing what you believe is “arrogant, presumptious” etc. If anyone can accept or reject it, what is so arrogant or presumptious?
I’m just giving you a hard time, forgive me.
).