A 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

Here is an example of LDS Church leaders retiring unwanted doctrine by playing with the concepts of “policy” and “doctrine”, and then making overtures of respect to the originators of that doctrine, in order to avoid violating LDS stare decisis.

In the nineteenth century, leaders of the Church taught that the practice of polygamy was an inextricable doctrine of Mormonism, and the only way to reach the highest levels of heaven. Continue reading

The legalistic aspects of Mormonism are fascinating to me.  Here is one.

Stare decisis is a legal concept meant to establish consistency in decisions made by courts. The idea is that once a decision has been made by a court about a certain point of law, future courts should respect that decision and follow suit. This approach conserves judicial resources by obviating the need for people to bring the same legal dispute to court over and over again, because they can look at past cases and reliably predict what a court is going to say about the issue.   It also causes people to take more seriously the decisions of current courts, because today’s decisions are going to hold weight with other courts in the future. Thus, it is a way for courts to legitimize their own decisions by respecting the decisions of their predecessors. Stare decisis is a practical strategy for dealing with the fact that reasonable judges will disagree about what the law means, and even though it sometimes enshrines erroneous decisions into the law, it is generally considered a useful and effective element of the judicial system.

A similar concept is at work for the top leaders of the LDS Church (considered “prophets, seers, and revelators” by believing members of the faith), though the process goes largely unacknowledged. Continue reading

When I was a BYU student, one of my professors was a fundamentalist-leaning member of the LDS Church. He took very seriously everything that LDS prophets have taught, from the beginning of the movement to the present. And LDS prophets have taught a lot, particularly in the beginning. Back then, they were real micromanagers, with an opinion on everything, and the expectation that their directions would be obeyed as the Word of God to His People (see e.g., this 1877 sermon, which is full of prophetic advice on domestic matters, including how to properly bake bread and feed children).

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I was born and raised a Mormon, in the LDS Church. At 19 years of age, I volunteered to be a missionary for the Church and was sent to a foreign country to spread the Gospel for two years. Upon returning home, I was fully committed to Mormonism. I believed that its doctrines were literally heaven-sent, and that it was the one pure source of philosophical, spiritual, religious, and even secular Truth in this world. I liked Mormon social institutions and the support they provided me as I followed the path of Truth. I felt lucky to have been born a Mormon.

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