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Doj Sues Polygamous Towns


Avatar4321

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For the most part, the folks in Colorado City and the states of Utah and Arizona have had a live and let live philosophy. But in the past several years, the town has become subject to the whims of Warren Jeffs, to the point where police officers would drive rebellious teenage boys out of town and kick them out of the police car, round up women trying to flee, or when utility workers cut off the power and water to homes of families that Jeffs had just arbitrarily kicked out of the church, then you had a theocracy, and one currently being run from a jail cell in TX.

I predict that things will get very....interesting down in that part of the country over the next several months.

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I found the last line concerning the Church and polygamy completely dishonest as well.

I think it is accurate, it just doesn't include the belief that the practice was discontinued due to the Lord's instruction because of his awareness of the outcome for the Church, not discontinued by the prophet or other leaders for the same reasons.
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http://news.yahoo.co...-210956592.html

I find the timing questionable. But I thought people would like to know what is going on with our "Fundamentalist" apostates.

I found the last line concerning the Church and polygamy completely dishonest as well.

From historytogo.utah.gov

"Once President Harrison had officially pardoned polygamists, the way was clear to press again for self-rule--work was begun on Utah's seventh attempt at admission into the Union."

"Recognizing that the Woodruff Manifesto indeed met conditions for admission to the Union,..."

"

The Manifesto was ratified by the church membership on October 6, 1890, and Mormons officially abandoned plural marriage as an essential church doctrine. It did not go down easily with many of the faithful, who asked with some bitterness, why? Why was it not done sooner and the suffering of past years avoided? The answer came from George Q. Cannon on October 18, 1890: "We have waited for the Lord to move in the matter."

The way was now open to deal for statehood and self-rule"

From BYU Enclyclopedia of Mormonism:

"...LDS agents secured approval from President Grover Cleveland's administration and from President of the Church John Taylor for a strategy of seeking statehood by accepting a Utah Constitution prohibiting plural marriage. President Taylor's belief in plural marriage remained unaltered, but he recognized that elected state officials would likely enforce marriage laws more leniently than appointed federal officials had done. In mid-1887 such a Constitution was framed and ratified in Utah. Despite these efforts, congressional Democrats balked at delivering statehood until the Church gave up polygamy"

And the Church does excommunicate polygamist.

What do you believe is dishonest about the last sentence?

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I think it is accurate, it just doesn't include the belief that the practice was discontinued due to the Lord's instruction because of his awareness of the outcome for the Church, not discontinued by the prophet or other leaders for the same reasons.

But it's not accurate. Utah Statehood had absolutely nothing to do with it.

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From historytogo.utah.gov

"Once President Harrison had officially pardoned polygamists, the way was clear to press again for self-rule--work was begun on Utah's seventh attempt at admission into the Union."

"Recognizing that the Woodruff Manifesto indeed met conditions for admission to the Union,..."

"

The Manifesto was ratified by the church membership on October 6, 1890, and Mormons officially abandoned plural marriage as an essential church doctrine. It did not go down easily with many of the faithful, who asked with some bitterness, why? Why was it not done sooner and the suffering of past years avoided? The answer came from George Q. Cannon on October 18, 1890: "We have waited for the Lord to move in the matter."

The way was now open to deal for statehood and self-rule"

From BYU Enclyclopedia of Mormonism:

"...LDS agents secured approval from President Grover Cleveland's administration and from President of the Church John Taylor for a strategy of seeking statehood by accepting a Utah Constitution prohibiting plural marriage. President Taylor's belief in plural marriage remained unaltered, but he recognized that elected state officials would likely enforce marriage laws more leniently than appointed federal officials had done. In mid-1887 such a Constitution was framed and ratified in Utah. Despite these efforts, congressional Democrats balked at delivering statehood until the Church gave up polygamy"

And the Church does excommunicate polygamist.

What do you believe is dishonest about the last sentence?

The obvious fact that no one ended plural marriage for statehood. It was ended because the Lord commanded. Utah becoming a state afterwards was just a nice benefit considering the nation had been denying it for over 50 years.Why on earth should anyone believe that the Church ended polygamy for something so insignificant when if that was a real reason, they could have ended it 50 years earlier and gotten that "goal" so much sooner?

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Okay, I get what you are saying now and would agree with it.

I was just saying that the discontinuation of polygamy was one step toward Utah getting accepted as a state, it was not the cause of the discontinuation nor the discontinuation the cause of Utah being accepted (it took quite some time afterwards for that to happen), but if it hadn't happened, I think it is accurate to say that Utah would not have become a state. (Utah would have ceased to exist...at least as then constructed, feds would have come in and taken over and redone it completely over in their own image.)

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name='Avatar4321' timestamp='1340605885' post='1209136852']

But it's not accurate. Utah Statehood had absolutely nothing to do with it.

From historytogo.utah.gov

"Once President Harrison had officially pardoned polygamists, the way was clear to press again for self-rule--work was begun on Utah's seventh attempt at admission into the Union."

"Recognizing that the Woodruff Manifesto indeed met conditions for admission to the Union,..."

"

The Manifesto was ratified by the church membership on October 6, 1890, and Mormons officially abandoned plural marriage as an essential church doctrine. It did not go down easily with many of the faithful, who asked with some bitterness, why? Why was it not done sooner and the suffering of past years avoided? The answer came from George Q. Cannon on October 18, 1890: "We have waited for the Lord to move in the matter."

The way was now open to deal for statehood and self-rule"

From BYU Enclyclopedia of Mormonism:

"...LDS agents secured approval from President Grover Cleveland's administration and from President of the Church John Taylor for a strategy of seeking statehood by accepting a Utah Constitution prohibiting plural marriage. President Taylor's belief in plural marriage remained unaltered, but he recognized that elected state officials would likely enforce marriage laws more leniently than appointed federal officials had done. In mid-1887 such a Constitution was framed and ratified in Utah. Despite these efforts, congressional Democrats balked at delivering statehood until the Church gave up polygamy"

And the Church does excommunicate polygamist.

What do you believe is dishonest about the last sentence?

Avatar4321, the writing is all over the wall.

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The obvious fact that no one ended plural marriage for statehood. It was ended because the Lord commanded. Utah becoming a state afterwards was just a nice benefit considering the nation had been denying it for over 50 years.Why on earth should anyone believe that the Church ended polygamy for something so insignificant when if that was a real reason, they could have ended it 50 years earlier and gotten that "goal" so much sooner?

Really? What specifically did the Lord say that lead you to that conclusion? When and where did he appear? Who saw and heard him? If he didn't appear in person, but through revelation, who was the vessel for that revelation, how did the Lord manifest his instruction ... a vision, words appearing in a seer stone?

I understand why its important for Mormons to want to believe that the Lord intervened and commanded the saints to end polygamy, but wishful thinking strikes me as a poor substitute for facts.

I have read the text of the manifesto. I didn't see anything in there to lead any objective observer or in this case, an objective reporter, to reach the conclusion that you are baldly asserting as a fact.

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Really? What specifically did the Lord say that lead you to that conclusion? When and where did he appear? Who saw and heard him? If he didn't appear in person, but through revelation, who was the vessel for that revelation, how did the Lord manifest his instruction ... a vision, words appearing in a seer stone?

I have had some revelations of late, and very important ones to me, and I will tell you what the Lord has said to me. Let me bring your minds to what is termed the manifesto. …

The Lord has told me to ask the Latter-day Saints a question, and He also told me that if they would listen to what I said to them and answer the question put to them, by the Spirit and power of God, they would all answer alike, and they would all believe alike with regard to this matter.

The question is this: Which is the wisest course for the Latter-day Saints to pursue—to continue to attempt to practice plural marriage, with the laws of the nation against it and the opposition of sixty millions of people, and at the cost of the confiscation and loss of all the Temples, and the stopping of all the ordinances therein, both for the living and the dead, and the imprisonment of the First Presidency and Twelve and the heads of families in the Church, and the confiscation of personal property of the people (all of which of themselves would stop the practice); or, after doing and suffering what we have through our adherence to this principle to cease the practice and submit to the law, and through doing so leave the Prophets, Apostles and fathers at home, so that they can instruct the people and attend to the duties of the Church, and also leave the Temples in the hands of the Saints, so that they can attend to the ordinances of the Gospel, both for the living and the dead?

The Lord showed me by vision and revelation exactly what would take place if we did not stop this practice. If we had not stopped it, you would have had no use for … any of the men in this temple at Logan; for all ordinances would be stopped throughout the land of Zion. Confusion would reign throughout Israel, and many men would be made prisoners. This trouble would have come upon the whole Church, and we should have been compelled to stop the practice. Now, the question is, whether it should be stopped in this manner, or in the way the Lord has manifested to us, and leave our Prophets and Apostles and fathers free men, and the temples in the hands of the people, so that the dead may be redeemed. A large number has already been delivered from the prison house in the spirit world by this people, and shall the work go on or stop? This is the question I lay before the Latter-day Saints. You have to judge for yourselves. I want you to answer it for yourselves. I shall not answer it; but I say to you that that is exactly the condition we as a people would have been in had we not taken the course we have.

… I saw exactly what would come to pass if there was not something done. I have had this spirit upon me for a long time. But I want to say this: I should have let all the temples go out of our hands; I should have gone to prison myself, and let every other man go there, had not the God of heaven commanded me to do what I did do; and when the hour came that I was commanded to do that, it was all clear to me. I went before the Lord, and I wrote what the Lord told me to write. …

I leave this with you, for you to contemplate and consider. The Lord is at work with us. (Cache Stake Conference, Logan, Utah, Sunday, November 1, 1891. Reported in Deseret Weekly, November 14, 1891.)

http://www.lds.org/scriptures/dc-testament/od/1?lang=eng
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Great. Now you can you tell me when the Lord appeared to Woodruff. What did he look like? who else saw him. When he says he wrote what the Lord told him to write, are you saying that the you believe the Lord told him to write this:

I, therefore, as President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, do hereby, in the most solemn manner, declare that these charges are false. We are not teaching polygamy or plural marriage, nor permitting any person to enter into its practice, and I deny that either forty or any other number of plural marriages have during that period been solemnized in our Temples or in any other place in the Territory.

That reads remarkably similar to SMith's public denials of polygamy.

and if God's that commanded Woodruff to end polygamy, why did he merely say this:

I hereby declare my intention to submit to those laws, and to use my influence with the members of the Church over which I preside to have them do likewise.

And I now publicly declare that my advice to the Latter-day Saints is to refrain from contracting any marriage forbidden by the law of the land.

Why not use that opportunity to declare God's command, rather that Woodruff's advice? Sorry but it makes no sense to attribute the manifesto as a commandment from God.

There is a reason that the polygamy was continued after the manifesto. Smith set the precedent for saying one thing for public consumption to the masses, while behaving otherwise in private. Its also obvious that the saints may not have ratified the manifesto if he did not tell the masses what they needed to hear.

You are, of course, welcome to believe that God commanded the saints to end polygamy, just as many members believed Smith when he denied polygamy. But lets not pretend, that its resolved question of historical fact that God commanded the saints to end polymamy.

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The obvious fact that no one ended plural marriage for statehood. It was ended because the Lord commanded. Utah becoming a state afterwards was just a nice benefit considering the nation had been denying it for over 50 years.Why on earth should anyone believe that the Church ended polygamy for something so insignificant when if that was a real reason, they could have ended it 50 years earlier and gotten that "goal" so much sooner?

Avatar, dont just repeat your original claim, address the facts presented.

Both BYU and the State of Utah disagree with you. Do you have facts to refute what is presented by BYU and the State of Utah.

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Avatar, dont just repeat your original claim, address the facts presented.

Both BYU and the State of Utah disagree with you. Do you have facts to refute what is presented by BYU and the State of Utah.

No. They dont. You asserting they do doesnt change anything.

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"However, the mainstream Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints abandoned the practice in 1890 as a condition of Utah's statehood and ex-communicates members who still engage in polygamy."

Are known unrepentant polygamist excommunicated?

Did the State of Utah, post on an Official website

historytogo.utah.gov

"Once President Harrison had officially pardoned polygamists, the way was clear to press again for self-rule--work was begun on Utah's seventh attempt at admission into the Union."

"Recognizing that the Woodruff Manifesto indeed met conditions for admission to the Union,..."

"

The Manifesto was ratified by the church membership on October 6, 1890, and Mormons officially abandoned plural marriage as an essential church doctrine. It did not go down easily with many of the faithful, who asked with some bitterness, why? Why was it not done sooner and the suffering of past years avoided? The answer came from George Q. Cannon on October 18, 1890: "We have waited for the Lord to move in the matter."

The way was now open to deal for statehood and self-rule"

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