John Dehlin Excommunication Discussion

[ERayR]

This reminds me of when I first began studying early Christian history and was astonished that we not only didn't use this stuff, we didn't even know about it.

 

Why was it kept hidden?    

[BlueDreams]

It was much worse than threatening status. An example of what the author includes that I have never even heard of is the story of a church leader (not Mormon) who was killed by a mob because he was thought to be supporting miscegenation. So the Carthage mobs weren't unique. Like the Mormons, one didn't have to actually be doing what was claimed. This minister was welcoming blacks into the congregation too enthusiastically. So the fear was that he would lure all the blacks to their town, it would be automatic intermarrying, their civilization would be destroyed. The minister wasn't, of course, advocating everybody marry each other. Didn't matter.

 

This reminds me of when I first began studying early Christian history and was astonished that we not only didn't use this stuff, we didn't even know about it.

 

Wow....I was thinking of an analogy of support miscegenation back in those day similar to saying you hold empathy toward al-queda and Isis, but thought it was a little too extreme of an analogy. Maybe it wasn't. But yeah, from the feel I get, mormons represented the potential destruction of good society, and miscegenation was proof positive of their degraded state, as well as potentially allowing blacks to gain too much power in society. 

 

This is among the top 10 reasons why I've never seriously wanted to visit the past....ever. People were crazy! I prefer the crazy times I'm in now.

 

With luv,

BD

Edited February 23, 2015 by BlueDreams

[why me]

It was much worse than threatening status. An example of what the author includes that I have never even heard of is the story of a church leader (not Mormon) who was killed by a mob because he was thought to be supporting miscegenation. So the Carthage mobs weren't unique. Like the Mormons, one didn't have to actually be doing what was claimed. This minister was welcoming blacks into the congregation too enthusiastically. So the fear was that he would lure all the blacks to their town, it would be automatic intermarrying, their civilization would be destroyed. The minister wasn't, of course, advocating everybody marry each other. Didn't matter.I

 

This reminds me of when I first began studying early Christian history and was astonished that we not only didn't use this stuff, we didn't even know about it.

I think that this could be one reason why brigham looked unfavorably on the black priesthood holder who took it upon himself to practice polygamy with white women. It would have been a disaster for the mormons if the outsiders would have found out. I suppose that he figured that the safest way to respond was to deny blacks the priesthood and yet, still welcome them as members.

[pogi]

I think that this could be one reason why brigham looked unfavorably on the black priesthood holder who took it upon himself to practice polygamy with white women. It would have been a disaster for the mormons if the outsiders would have found out. I suppose that he figured that the safest way to respond was to deny blacks the priesthood and yet, still welcome them as members.

 

I think it is more likely that he bought into the racism of the day.  Or, so his words make it seem. 

[why me]

I think it is more likely that he bought into the racism of the day.  Or, so his words make it seem.

But there had to be a catalyst for the ban. I don't think that it came out of thin air. My understanding that it was the main reason for the ban.

 

https://divinity.uchicago.edu/sightings/wrong-side-white-w-paul-reeve

 

It is impossible to understand that trajectory without first understanding the ways in which white Mormons themselves were racialized. The prevailing American fear of interracial mixing played a significant role in that process, especially as outsiders projected their own alarm over race mixing onto Mormons. At Kirtland, outsiders suggested that Black Pete received revelations to marry white women. In Missouri settlers argued that Mormons were inviting free black converts to that state, not only to incite a slave rebellion but to steal white women.

 

After the Mormons openly announced the practice of polygamy in 1852, the charge of interracial mixing took on a life of its own. One Army doctor filed a report with the United States Senate in which he claimed polygamy was giving rise to a degenerate "race." Political cartoons depicted interracial polygamous families, sometimes with black, Asian, and Native American wives mixed in among the white. In a variety of ways outsiders constructed Mormons as racially suspect, facilitators of interracial mixing and therefore of racial contamination. As one news account put it, "the days of the white race are numbered in this country." At the crux of this fearful deterioration was the "American of the future," "a black Mormon."

 

 

This is an interesting article. I think that there is more to the story than racism by brigham.

Edited February 23, 2015 by why me

[juliann]

I think that this could be one reason why brigham looked unfavorably on the black priesthood holder who took it upon himself to practice polygamy with white women. It would have been a disaster for the mormons if the outsiders would have found out. I suppose that he figured that the safest way to respond was to deny blacks the priesthood and yet, still welcome them as members.

 

Outsiders already thought that. And they didn't care what Mormons said about themselves. There is no way to extricate BY from "racism." His rhetoric was just as bad if not worse....he called for death on the spot, remember. Further, Orson Pratt (I hope I'm remembering the name correctly) fought him tooth and nail about shutting the door on blacks. So it wasn't like there weren't other vocalized options.

 

Reeve gives a trajectory of the ban and the justifications surrounding it, step by step beginning with BY. He is not the one that introduced the less valiant angle, for instance.  When you see the formation of the situation we were in in 1978, there is no way to say well here is where the Lord said to do such and such. They weren't even claiming revelation themselves. That only starts when the statements about it being the way the Lord set it up from the beginning with no modern revelation mentioned. It was exactly the way gay issues are being framed now when there is no modern revelation that can be appealed to. I am not drawing any conclusions or judgements from that, BTW. But it did take me aback.

[Teancum]

So it's not very often that I change my name title. But dialogue in this thread has resulted in my doing just that.

 

Behold my new name title.

  Well I am glad you have a sense of humor and that my misuse of the English language provided and opportunity for you.

[Scott Lloyd]

  Well I am glad you have a sense of humor and that my misuse of the English language provided and opportunity for you.

There are several ways to deal with insults. One way is to try to see the humor in them and to make light of them.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Scott Lloyd

[Teancum]

There are several ways to deal with insults. One way is to try to see the humor in them and to make light of them.

Indeed.