Mar 2 2010

Stare Decisis and the Priesthood Ban

Poor Wayfaring Man

Here is another example of LDS Church leaders retiring unwanted doctrine by playing with the concepts of “policy” and “doctrine” in order to avoid violating LDS stare decisis.

Despite early acceptance of black men into the LDS priesthood, the Church, beginning with Brigham Young in at least 1852 (and possibly earlier, with Joseph Smith), taught for more than 100 years that black people bore the Mark of Cain, which labeled them as a cursed and disfavored people in the eyes of God, and unable, therefore, to be part of the LDS priesthood. Continue reading


Feb 18 2010

Some Things Cannot be Changed

Poor Wayfaring Man

Here is another post inspired, in part, by a reader’s comment.  Deep Throat in the Deep South,1 in a comment rich with interesting Mormon cultural material, wrote the following:

Every blessing we have is predicated upon a law. You break the law, the blessing is gone.

There is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated— And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated. (D&C 130: 20-21)2

One must be intelligent not to confuse administrative actions with the Gospel of Jesus Christ (i.e. truth) in its purest mode. There is a different between administration of earthly issues, the Truth of the Gospel, and, and what I call the “Doctrine of the Culture,” that some people cling to instead of the doctrine.

As a Mormon, I struggled with the legalistic LDS belief that all blessings a person receives from God are actually dependent upon his or her obedience to a specific Law (or body of Laws) of Heaven.  The reason I struggled is that I could never pin down exactly what the Law was, despite the fact that I was desperate to follow it.  (That seems to be a common theme in the LDS Church.) Continue reading

  1. Yeah, the irony of an apparently straight-laced Mormon naming him or herself Deep Throat hasn’t escaped me.  I assume the name is referring somehow to the Watergate informant, rather than the classic porn movie from which the informant’s pseudonym was derived.  Then again, either reference is kind of random. []
  2. By the way, this section of the Doctrine & Covenants (which is LDS scripture on par with the Bible or the Book of Mormon) is a treasure trove of canonized Mormon oddities, like Joseph Smith’s unfulfilled prediction about growing unrest in the American South (that eventually developed into the Civil War) being a precursor to the second coming of Jesus Christ, his cautiously hedged prediction that Jesus Christ’s second coming would happen prior to his 85th birthday (1890), his explanation for why the Holy Ghost is incorporeal, his insight into the planets that God and the angels live on, his view of what the afterlife is generally like, and other fun stuff.  Definitely worth a read, since these things are part of the “meat” of the Gospel that Mormons don’t share with outsiders very often (the “milk” always comes first). []

Nov 25 2009

Book of Mormon Stories Metaphors

Poor Wayfaring Man

I was browsing the internet the other day and found a really interesting blog that discusses events and hot topics at BYU’s Provo campus. In this post about the conflict between the religious world and the secular world, the liberal-leaning Mormon author seems to support (very tentatively and with ample obligatory qualifications to deflect charges of heresy, since he is a BYU student) the view that the creation account in Genesis (six days, etc.) is just a metaphor, not literally true.

This seems like a neat and tidy way to avoid conflicts between science and religion–just treat the religious view as a divinely-inspired metaphor only.
Continue reading


Oct 26 2009

On Covenanting with the Lord

Poor Wayfaring Man

The “Covenanting with the Lord” program, discussed in the previous post, is interesting to me because it puts to the test the promises of the Lord found in LDS scripture, and the beliefs of the mainstream LDS Church regarding those promises. It is anchored in the concept of testimony, relying on a person’s ability to discern the promptings of the Holy Ghost to come up with solutions to a given problem. Once a solution is found, especially if it requires divine intervention, it is presented to the Lord for ratification (and miracles).

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Oct 25 2009

My Testimonies: Example 3

Poor Wayfaring Man

I have had experiences with testimony. Lots of them. Here is Example 3:

When I had been proselyting as a missionary for just about three months, my Mission President (the volunteer LDS clergy supervising the activities of the entire mission) assigned me to work in a new city with a partner (i.e., a “companion”) who was in the final month of his two-year term of missionary service. The Mission President met with me to tell me I was chosen for the assignment because this missionary needed a faithful, enthusiastic companion to try a new method of proselyting that had the potential to usher in a surge of baptisms in the mission. It was called “Covenanting with the Lord”.

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Oct 24 2009

My Testimonies: Example 2

Poor Wayfaring Man

I have had experiences with testimony. Lots of them. Here is Example 2:

When I was 18 years old, I realized that I was mere months away from high school graduation, and that I was expected to follow through on my lifelong plan to go on a two-year mission for the LDS Church, during which time I would work to persuade people to join the Church. I decided that I should prepare for my mission by making an effort to learn more about the Church than I had learned in Sunday school and daily seminary classes.

I found a book on my dad’s bookshelf titled Indian Origins and the Book of Mormon. Continue reading


Oct 23 2009

My Testimonies: Example 1

Poor Wayfaring Man

I have had experiences with testimony. Lots of them. Here is Example 1:

When I was a child, maybe 8 or 9 years old, I thought up the concept of reincarnation. I didn’t know it by name, and I didn’t know that anybody else had ever thought of it. What I did know is that I got a real charge out of contemplating the possibility that my soul could inhabit another body and I could live another life again after this one was over. The feeling I felt as I put the theory together in my mind was something I hadn’t felt before. It was a spine-tingling, euphoric, exciting sensation. Everything seemed to make sense at that moment, and for that moment I felt a sense of clarity, confidence, and peace about my future that overwhelmed my usual petty concerns and fears. I still remember it.

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Oct 22 2009

Testimony

Poor Wayfaring Man

Every member of the LDS Church knows the importance of developing a strong personal or “spiritual” conviction (a “testimony”) regarding certain facts surrounding the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.1 A testimony is considered a gift from God, delivered to a person by the Holy Ghost, a spirit-messenger of God, who communicates through a spiritual power that manifests itself in different ways to different people, typically as difficult-to-define sensations and thoughts. Every member is expected to have a testimony of at least the following key facts:
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  1. Apostle Gordon B. Hinckley said: “I would like to say to you, that is the strength of this cause, the individual testimony that lies in the hearts of the people. The strength of this church is not in its buildings, in its chapels, in its offices, in its schools; it is not in its programs or its publications. They are important, but they are only a means to an end, and that the end is the building of the testimony – a conviction that will weather every storm and stand up to every crisis in the hearts and lives of the membership.” (Gordon B. Hinckley, Area Conference Report, August 1971, Manchester, England, pp. 160-161. As quoted in Testimony, pp. 8-9) []

Oct 20 2009

Criticism Matters

Poor Wayfaring Man

In 1844, in the wake of the Prophet Joseph Smith’s murder at the hands of a mob in a Carthage, Illinois jail, he was eulogized by a very close friend, John Taylor, with the following statement:

“Joseph Smith, the Prophet and Seer of the Lord, has done more, save Jesus only, for the salvation of men in this world, than any other man that ever lived in it.”

Now, that’s pretty high praise coming from a Christian. Maybe a little too high? Continue reading


Oct 19 2009

Jack Mormons and Apostates

Poor Wayfaring Man

There are basically two kinds of people who leave the LDS Church. I will call them “Jack Mormons” and “Apostates”. Apostates are people who leave (or are excommunicated) because they have stopped believing in some or all of the religious tenets of the LDS faith. Jack Mormons are people who leave (or are excommunicated) for reasons other than non-belief, like being unable or unwilling to follow the rules, or because of interpersonal conflicts with other community members.

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