Righting Past Wrongs

There are two public statements which the LDS church has made recently which have made me proud. The first was in response to the Jewish church's statement after finding out that in spite of promises made by LDS church authorities, baptisms of Holocaust victims were still being done: "We are outraged that such insensitive actions continue in the Mormon temples," said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center and one of the Jewish representatives who participated in the Mormon/Jewish discussions of the matter. "Such actions make a mockery of the many meetings with the top leadership of the Mormon church dating back to 1995 that focused on the unwanted and unwarranted posthumous baptisms of Jewish victims of the Nazi Holocaust." The actions of a few rogue members of the LDS church, unfortunately was broadcast nationwide at a time when the church is very much at the forefront because of Presidential nominee Mitt Romney. Their actions are NOT representative of me or the majority of the LDS church and the record needed to be set straight in a very public manner.  This was their statement to the media: "We sincerely regret that the actions of an individual member of the church led to the inappropriate submission of these names," church spokesman Scott Trotter said. "These submissions were clearly against the policy of the church. We consider this a serious breach of our protocol and we have suspended indefinitely this person's ability to access our genealogy records."

The next recent statement was made after a BYU professor named Randy Bott who wrote an article for the Washington Post regarding why blacks were banned from the priesthood until 1976.  Bott pointed to Mormon scriptures that indicate descendants of the biblical Cain — who killed his brother Abel and was “cursed” by God — were black and subsequently barred from the priesthood. He also noted that past LDS leaders suggested blacks were less valiant in the sphere known in Mormon theology as the “premortal existence.”  The longtime religion professor at BYU further argued that blacks were not ready for the Mormon priesthood, Post reporter Jason Horowitz wrote, “like a young child prematurely asking for the keys to her father’s car.”  It was incredibly offensive on many levels and quickly set off a firestorm of commentators.  Once again, one ill-informed, and in this case racist, individual proceeds to damage the church's reputation when he chooses to seemingly speak for a church that is already very much in a critical spotlight.  The church responded succinctly with this statement:  Bott's comments, the church said, “absolutely do not represent the teachings and doctrines of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”  It went on to say that “the church’s position is clear — we believe all people are God’s children and are equal in his eyes and in the church. We do not tolerate racism in any form.”  As to the question of the now-discarded ban on blacks in the priesthood, the church said: “It is not known precisely why, how, or when this restriction began but what is clear is that it ended decades ago.”  


Now, we as a church need to go one step further.  We need to attempt to right a wrong that was made in our history by admitting it was indeed wrong.

Even if we express gratitude that the practice changed, if we are unwilling to admit that it changed precisely because it was wrong, that it was an evil made good, an error corrected, a wrong righted, then our gratitude itself still subtly accepts and upholds a fundamentally racist view of the world. It says “it’s totally okay to withhold temple covenants and sealings on the basis of race, but thank goodness we aren’t doing that right now.”

So, yes, I’m saying that an unwillingness to call the former policy racist and, therefore, wrong, unjustified, harmful, un-Christian, and indefensibly regrettable is, however subtly, still fundamentally racist. The priesthood/temple ban is, at present, not just a symptom of a racist past. It is a thorn in the side, an unhealed open wound on the body of a still racist present. And the sooner we can collectively realize that our unwillingness to fully condemn the racism of our past preserves a deep nucleus of that past racism in our present, the sooner we can actually experience the full power of repentance.  I am saying that similar to the United States posthumously apologizing for the atrocities committed upon the Native Americans, the Chinese, and just about every other minority that exists, I believe the LDS church should do the same.  

This is based upon certain aspects of my belief system:

*The church does not need to exist in a vacuum of perfection.  It can still be the "true church" and admit to mistakes made, current or in the past.  I will never understand why this belief is so blasphemous to some individuals.

*I can no longer pretend that it's "faith" that keeps me quiet on certain aspects of church history.  This insistence on staying mum on such issues, perpetuates what I believe to be decisions based in racism as well as the black eye that is on the church because of these things.  I refuse to believe that "it was God's fault" in essence that we had a racist stance against blacks.

*I don't believe that blacks not having the priesthood was a revelation.  I believe it was a symptom of the cultural beliefs of that time, which is understandable, but still wrong.

I found this quote on one of my favorite LDS blogs (by common consent):  "God is no more responsible for forcibly eliminating the sins of a Church guided by revelation than He is for forcibly eliminating the sins of individual lives guided by revelation.  All must repent.  All must acknowledge our sins. We must grieve over the harm they have caused, in full awareness of the terrible evil of it all. The power of the atonement is not limited to individual lives.  It is the power that makes it possible for God to work His great work through the imperfect, flawed, often prideful, and always sinful individuals that make up the body of Christ. If yesterday’s embarrassment and its horrible aftermath show us anything, it is that our lack of repentance as a people and as a Church is still a major obstacle to our achieving our full divine potential. The Kingdom’s growth and, by extension, the people of the world are paying a price for our unwillingness to publicly confess our sin, which we instead hide under a cloak of un-Christian folklore and false-doctrine and proud insistence that it wasn’t our fault, it was really God’s. When you have committed a great evil, and when you persisted in committing it for an extended period and at incalculable human cost, anything short of fully acknowledging it for what it truly is, and of anguished, broken-hearted contrition for having done it is not full repentance. And without full repentance, full redemption is not possible, but instead one must continue to suffer for one’s iniquities."  Wow.  Incredibly powerful and in my estimation, incredibly true.

I am thankful to a church that is willing to speak up for itself, and proud that it has become more vocal in defending itself against false beliefs from outside the church as well as inside. I believe that going just one step further in apologizing for the wrongs of the past, would aid tremendously in healing our relationship with black members.