A question for ex-mormons here

[Disco]

Please help me out on this one. I am having a discussion on another board regarding changes of doctrine in churches. Someone said that the LDS doctrine regarding blacks and the priesthood was not changed, that it was always known that blacks would be allowed the priesthood "someday".

I had not heard that before. Is it true? Can anyone give me a link if it isn't?

Thanks for any help!

MHB

[ma1ic3]

I was never a mormon, but here is some info on it.

From: http://www.lds-mormon.com/taxes_priesthood.shtml
Salt Lake Tribune
public forum
Distorted History
Thursday, April 5, 2001

It's one thing to distort history, quite another to invent it. Kathy Erickson (Forum, March 11) claims that the federal government threatened The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with its tax-exempt status in 1978 because of the church's position regarding blacks and the priesthood.

We state categorically that the federal government made no such threat in 1978 or at any other time. The decision to extend the blessings of the priesthood to all worthy males had nothing to do with federal tax policy or any other secular law. In the absence of proof, we conclude that Ms. Erickson is seriously mistaken.

[Nyarlathotep]

Originally posted by ooh_child
Please help me out on this one. I am having a discussion on another board regarding changes of doctrine in churches. Someone said that the LDS doctrine regarding blacks and the priesthood was not changed, that it was always known that blacks would be allowed the priesthood "someday".

I had not heard that before. Is it true? Can anyone give me a link if it isn't?

Thanks for any help!

MHB

I'm an ex-Mormon. I have heard many rationalizatons of why the church suddenly received a revelation from God to change their stance at that particualr time, but not that particualr one.

[Disco]

Well, I think I found something to relate to her position:

www.angelfire.com/mo2/blackmormon/homepage.html (http://www.angelfire.com/mo2/blackmormon/homepage.html)

"Joseph Smith did ordain free black men, butnot black slaves. Brigham Young (in 1852) widened that "ban" to all black men; based upon Abraham 1:26 in the Pearl of Great Price (included as Scripture in 1852). Brigham Young initiated the Priesthood-ban (excluding people of Hamitic lineage) from the Priesthood and higher-ordinances of the Temple (sealings and Endowments) in 1852. The reason he gave was that "Negroes" were the descendants of Cain, and Cain killed Abel; it would be against the justice of God to extend the Priesthood to the descendants of Cain (Negroes) before Abel and the Abelites first had the opportunity to receive it. Who are the Abelites? We don't know."

So I guess that in 1978 all the "Abelites" had been given the opportunity, so now it was ok for the black men to become priests? But that site still insists it WAS a change in doctrine.

Ny, from your experience, does this make mormon sense?


:confused: :confused:

MHB

[Scot C. Trypal]

Someone said that the LDS doctrine regarding blacks and the priesthood was not changed, that it was always known that blacks would be allowed the priesthood "someday".

It wasn’t changed because we always knew it would change?

I’ve heard this one before but it never made much sense.

[Nyarlathotep]

Originally posted by ooh_child


Ny, from your experience, does this make mormon sense?


:confused: :confused:

MHB

Yes and no. Bear with me because I haven't been an active Mormon for nearly 20 years so my memories of the fine points of doctrine are fuzzy, but I do recall that the rationale was that Black people were 'marked' for the sins of their ancestors and thus were denied the priesthood. But I recall nothing about Cainites or Abelites. In fact, I vaguely recall Blacks as supposedly descended from Ham, and marked for his transgressions, not Cain's.


In any case, it was indeed a change of doctrine, having been handed down from God to the Prophet of the Church. I recall several rationales for the timing, most of them being kind of fuzzy along the lines of 'Well, God just decided it was time' (rather like the reason polygamy suddenly stopped being okay) but nothing about Cainites or Abelites or 'Well it was going to happen all along, it was just a matter of when'.

Of course, the Mormon church (like any religious sect) has groups within it that spin church doctrines their own way, not to mention a few outright splinter groups, so it is possible SOME Mormons beleive that, or that the branch I belonged to was somehow different, so I wouldn't call it a falsehood either.

[Kopji]

A collection of quotes:
http://www.lds-mormon.com/racism.shtml

The passage in the BoM might be what they are referring to, that 'someday they might become a white and delightsome people'.

You might ask.

[RandFan]

Originally posted by ooh_child
Please help me out on this one. I am having a discussion on another board regarding changes of doctrine in churches. Someone said that the LDS doctrine regarding blacks and the priesthood was not changed, that it was always known that blacks would be allowed the priesthood "someday".

I had not heard that before. Is it true? Can anyone give me a link if it isn't?

Thanks for any help!

MHB I've heard all kinds of stuff. I've heard something like this but nothing official. It is really difficult to gauge the information one hears. Even the official version of things change. Which is odd because on some things that are negative to the Church it is up front and honest, some things it spins and something's it lies about, IMO.

When I was a member I was quite skeptical of anything that I didn't know specifically or hear directly. There is a popular phrase from the more skeptical of members, "faith promoting rumors". I could tell you many such revisionist stories. What is odd that there were Mormons who were African American before the change.

[RandFan]

Originally posted by ooh_child
So I guess that in 1978 all the "Abelites" had been given the opportunity, so now it was ok for the black men to become priests? But that site still insists it WAS a change in doctrine. All those who are not "black" are Abelites. There is no getting around this one. Nothing significant changed but the rule. Bear in mind Brigham Young used to preach that men lived on the moon. The guy had his good qualities but he was a little whacked in the head.

[Disco]

Thank you all for your responses. Wow Kopji! Those were some revealing quotes there. It had been a long time since I'd been exposed to the kind of racism that those quotes reflect.

I tried to get her to clarify the position a little further, and maybe she is just differentiating between doctrine & policy. This is what she wrote in reply:

"The point is, and I will reiterate, this doctrine included a promise and knowledge that black members would receive the Priesthood at some future day. Some believed it would be in the next life and others felt it would happen sooner; therefore, when it did happen, it was not a change. Black people who joined the church in the 1800s up until 1978 and beyond probably have the best spiritual understanding of this."

Looking at some of Kopji's quotes though, I don't think those folks subscribed to the "someday" part of the doctrine.

MHB

[RandFan]

Originally posted by Kopji
A collection of quotes:
http://www.lds-mormon.com/racism.shtml

The passage in the BoM might be what they are referring to, that 'someday they might become a white and delightsome people'.

You might ask. I had great respect for Mark E. Peterson. My father knew him and my best freind was a relative (his step father was anyway).

Mark E. Peterson is an ass.

Now we are generous with the Negro. We are willing that the Negro have the highest education. I would be willing to let every Negro drive a Cadillac if they could afford it. I would be willing that they have all the advantages they can get out of life in the world. But let them enjoy these things among themselves. I think the Lord segregated the Negro and who is man to change that segregation? It reminds me of the scripture on marriage, "what God hath joined together, let not man put asunder." Only here we have the reverse of the thing -- what God hath separated, let not man bring together again."