Interesting trek change

[mfbukowski]

15 hours ago, changed said:

Sounds like the church is trying to distance itself from its history.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ must become the focal point, not ancestor worship.

Yes it is important to remember but we have pioneers today leaving familes for the church too, and we seldom acknowledge that. This is a living Gospel and must focus more on the living.

[mfbukowski]

13 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I’ve heard the late Bill Hartley, one of the foremost experts on the Mormon Trail, talk about this.

The handcart chapter in Church history lasted only about four years before this means of travel was rendered obsolete, first by the down-and-back wagon expeditions and ultimately by the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869. 

Hartley said that, by-and-large, the handcart experiment was successful. Of the 10 handcart companies, only the Willey and Martin companies could be considered failures, and they appear to be anomalies due to extraordinary circumstances. The rest accomplished the purpose for which they were intended: to get more people overland to the Salt Lake Valley at minimal expense. 

The handcart saga does tend to get disproportionate attention in our collective consciousness regarding the Utah pioneer experience. It didn’t even begin until a decade after the Nauvoo/Winter Quarters exodus, and, as I said, it only lasted four years. The vast majority of our forebears traveled by ox train and, ultimately, by railroad. 

YOUR forebearers. 

Yes they went through incredible obstacles to preserve and protect the gospel, and for that we must always be forever grateful.

But leaving out recent converts not wise, and it is very divisive. I think you don't know how hard it is to NOT have Pioneer ancestry in this church, or not to have your family history "done" before you are baptized. 

 

Edited October 22, 2018 by mfbukowski

[ALarson]

5 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I looked at both of your links. 

What struck me with both pieces is that they focus exclusively on the Willey and Martin handcart treks — which I have acknowledged were failures — and ignore the other eight handcart treks that transpired during this four-year chapter in Church history. 

I agree (and that's also where most of the faith promoting stories come from as well....those two treks.)

Scott, you asked a question and I supplied links and information as to why some don't feel as positive about doing these reenactments.  I know there are great stories of heroism and faith.  No one has stated there aren't.  But there is doubt regarding what the leaders did and how inspired these treks were when there were some horrible experiences and tragic results.  There are many myths associated with the treks too and some things that have been told over and over that are simply not the truth.  When members learn the truth, they still know these saints were heroes, but wonder how some of the leaders could have possibly been inspired to do this.

Every time our ward or stake has decided to do this trek, we've had members who come to us and tell us they can't support it and that their youth will not be participating.  These treks haven't always been well planned in the past and kids have actually died on them because of poor planning.  Many changes have been made (which is good), but some members still don't support them for many reasons (including those I've given in answer to your question).

I applaud rongo's efforts and love the changes that he describes.  

Edited October 22, 2018 by ALarson

[halconero]

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

YOUR forebearers. 

Yes they went through incredible obstacles to preserve and protect the gospel, and for that we must always be forever grateful.

But leaving out recent converts not wise, and it is very divisive. I think you don't know how hard it is to NOT have Pioneer ancestry in this church, or not to have your family history "done" before you are baptized. 

 

Out of curiosity where are you located? I'm just wondering if it's partially a geography thing, as I've encountered zero difficulty with not having pioneer ancestry in the church, and even some jealousy that I still have direct family history work to do.

[HappyJackWagon]

12 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Two handcart treks had disastrous outcomes arguably due to a string of poor decisions in their execution. But the success of the eight other handcart companies proved that the concept was workable. 

As I said to ALarson, I regard it as myopic to evaluate the entire four-year venture solely on the Willey and Martin company episodes as though the successful treks had never occurred. So no, I don’t agree that the Church is backing away from the handcart history nor that it should. 

In the history of aviation, There have been many disasters, yet we don’t discontinue flight travel because of them. 

As for the other things you listed, it is obvious you have a generally negative disposition about the Church of Jesus Christ and its past, but that does not justify a conclusion that the Church has any intention to “distance itself from its history.”

Quote

I looked at both of your links. 

What struck me with both pieces is that they focus exclusively on the Willey and Martin handcart treks — which I have acknowledged were failures — and ignore the other eight handcart treks that transpired during this four-year chapter in Church history. 

How much do you know about those other eight treks, those that came before and after the Martin and Willey companies? How much reading have you done on them? I see no indication that you know anything at all about them, much less enough to pronounce the entire four-year venture uninspired.

I think a lot of casual observers —certainly the writers you link to here — look at this subject very myopically and regard the 1856 disasters as reflecting the sum total of the entire handcart experience. That was the point I endeavored to make in my last post, a point you appear to have missed. 

I'll admit that I don't know much about them but it sounds like you've done some extensive reading/research. I'll also admit that if I was about to undertake a long journey, following the inspiration of others, and was told that there was a 20% chance our journey would end in catastrophe, I don't think I'd be too confident in taking those odds.

You indicate that only 2 disasters out of 10 treks would seem to support the notion that they were "inspired" and you seem to be mocking Changed and ALarson for not knowing "anything at all about them".

Do you happen to know how many total people made one of those 10 treks? Do you know how many people perished along the trek? Do you know how many of the survivors suffered serious, long-term bodily harm (amputation etc)? I don't know any of those answers so I'd be interested if you or someone else could share.

[mfbukowski]

6 hours ago, halconero said:

Out of curiosity where are you located? I'm just wondering if it's partially a geography thing, as I've encountered zero difficulty with not having pioneer ancestry in the church, and even some jealousy that I still have direct family history work to do.

So you have  never heard "Well I am 7th generation Mormon......" as if one then knows more than one who is only 6th generation?  

Los Angeles area.

And then there are those who think  family history work is now VERY easy because all you do is log in and you get clues about your ancestors and temple names just waiting for  you.

How they get  those  destroyed Polish parish records  from Poland is pretty magic  I guess.  They must have time machines..... 

I suppose  Salt Lake City or Nauvoo was never carpet bombed....   

And all  those apps that show  what famous people  you are related to??   fergitaboutit! 

 

Edited October 22, 2018 by mfbukowski

[bsjkki]

1 hour ago, HappyJackWagon said:

I'll admit that I don't know much about them but it sounds like you've done some extensive reading/research. I'll also admit that if I was about to undertake a long journey, following the inspiration of others, and was told that there was a 20% chance our journey would end in catastrophe, I don't think I'd be too confident in taking those odds.

You indicate that only 2 disasters out of 10 treks would seem to support the notion that they were "inspired" and you seem to be mocking Changed and ALarson for not knowing "anything at all about them".

Do you happen to know how many total people made one of those 10 treks? Do you know how many people perished along the trek? Do you know how many of the survivors suffered serious, long-term bodily harm (amputation etc)? I don't know any of those answers so I'd be interested if you or someone else could share.

Here is a link to the Bashore study on pioneer mortality. https://byustudies.byu.edu/content/mortality-mormon-trail-1847-1868  I can't copy the charts and graphs but it is very interesting.

"The number of deaths reported in table 2 is based on deaths recorded in personal diaries and/or reported in the company records. There are 1,910  deaths, giving a mortality rate of approximately 3.41%. Of these there were 930 female deaths (3.48%) and 944 male deaths (3.27%). Table 3 presents the breakdown of deaths by gender for this cohort of immigrants. The “Unknown” column represents those individuals whose gender is unknown. The “Unknown” row represents the counts of those individuals for whom we have a record that they traveled with a company but for whom we could not confirm a date of death, so it is unknown whether they survived the trail. Experts usually assume that those with unknown dates of death did not die on the trail but died after reaching the Salt Lake Valley. We make the same assumption here. From this table we note that there were 26,761 females and 28,901 males we can identify, with 380 individuals (last column) for whom sex could not be determined. Age distribution of the pioneers is given in table  4, including the number of deaths in each age group. The mortality rates for those age 10 to 29 is less than 1.70%. This cohort of 21,607 individuals who arrived (comprising almost 40% of those emigrating during this time period) make up the “pioneer” stock that initially colonized the Great Basin and beyond, followed by the 12,942 surviving infants and children who would grow up in the Rocky Mountains...

The Willie and Martin handcart companies accounted for almost 39% of the immigrants crossing by handcart. These two companies had a mortality rate of about 16.5%. The extremely high mortality rates in these two companies are well known. Figures 6 and 7 show that mortality rates for the other handcart companies were considerably smaller (about 4.5%) but still (statistically significantly) higher than the mortality rates of the wagon train immigrants (about 3.4%). These are overall rates and do not adjust for any difference in ages of the handcart pioneers versus the wagon train pioneers. Figure 8 gives the mortality rates by departure month."

 

Edited October 23, 2018 by bsjkki

[Scott Lloyd]

4 hours ago, HappyJackWagon said:

I'll admit that I don't know much about them but it sounds like you've done some extensive reading/research. I'll also admit that if I was about to undertake a long journey, following the inspiration of others, and was told that there was a 20% chance our journey would end in catastrophe, I don't think I'd be too confident in taking those odds.

You indicate that only 2 disasters out of 10 treks would seem to support the notion that they were "inspired" and you seem to be mocking Changed and ALarson for not knowing "anything at all about them".

Do you happen to know how many total people made one of those 10 treks? Do you know how many people perished along the trek? Do you know how many of the survivors suffered serious, long-term bodily harm (amputation etc)? I don't know any of those answers so I'd be interested if you or someone else could share.

Here’s a reliable link where you can  begin your study of the handcart saga: 

https://www.lds.org/ensign/1997/08/they-came-by-handcart?lang=eng

An accompanying chart shows that except for the Martin and Willey companies, the deaths per handcart company were in the single digits or unrecorded, with the exception of the first company, in which 13 deaths occurred en route. 

You claim a 20 percent chance the journeys would “end in catastrophe.”  I think that’s over-simplifying the matter. You’ll see from the chart that all the handcart journeys after the Martin and Willey treks were relatively uneventful with a successively decreasing death toll. I think it’s a safe assumption that had the handcart treks continued (remember that they were eventually rendered obsolete by the down-and-back wagon trains and the coming of the railroad) they would have sustained that trend with the benefit of skill and good judgment acquired from past experience. I still think it’s myopic to find fault with the entire four-year venture based only on the anomalous perfect storm of misfortune that beset the Willey and Martin companies. 

You said you don’t know much about the handcart trains. Were you even aware there were eight other handcart companies besides the Martin and Willey companies and that those eight were successful in their journeys? 

Edited October 23, 2018 by Scott Lloyd

[Scott Lloyd]

16 hours ago, Kenngo1969 said:

Levi Savage and Francis Webster are two of my personal handcart heroes:

 

 

 

 

I’m well acquainted with this account, and I agree it is very moving. 

It should be noted, however, that it is not precisely accurate with regard to none of the company ever apostatizing. There were, in fact, a few who left the Church in later years.  

There have been some unfavorable comparisons made here on this thread to the Donner-Reed diasaster, which happened about the same time period. I think it important to note that the victims and survivors in the handcart trains bore up under their adversities with greater fortitude, that they did not suffer the same gruesome fate that beset the Donner party. It is my heartfelt belief that this is due to the spiritual strength recounted in this quotation you have shared here. 

Edited October 23, 2018 by Scott Lloyd

[Kenngo1969]

4 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I’m well acquainted with this account, and I agree it is very moving. 

It should be noted, however, that it is not precisely accurate with regard to none of the company ever apostatizing. There were, in fact, a few who left the Church in later years.  

There have been some unfavorable comparisons made here on this thread to the Donner-Reed diasaster, which happened about the same time period. I think it important to note that the victims and survivors in the handcart trains bore up under their adversities with greater fortitude, that they did not suffer the same gruesome fate that beset the Donner party. It is my heartfelt belief that this is due to the spiritual strength recounted in this quotation you have shared here. 

Fair enough.  The fact remains that, insofar as I am aware, Francis Webster, along with his wife, remained faithful. 

[changed]

15 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

The Gospel of Jesus Christ must become the focal point, not ancestor worship.

Yes it is important to remember but we have pioneers today leaving familes for the church too, and we seldom acknowledge that. This is a living Gospel and must focus more on the living.

 

When the point of the celestial kingdom is "together forever", there is no point for those without a family.  the LDS church does seem to worship ancestors - are very big on "who begat who", what your family line is ... it is part of racism - the obsession with genealogy.  

 

18 hours ago, Kenngo1969 said:

At least two people who were in either the Martin or Willey Handcart Companies acknowledged that it was a mistake to send the companies out so late in the season (see my previous post).  Is death the worst possible fate that could befall a person?  It seems, based on some of the experiences you, yourself, have had, that you would disagree.  So would the Savior:

 

 

BY did not consider it a mistake... I agree death is not the worst fate... 

 

19 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Two handcart treks had disastrous outcomes arguably due to a string of poor decisions in their execution. But the success of the eight other handcart companies proved that the concept was workable. 

As I said to ALarson, I regard it as myopic to evaluate the entire four-year venture solely on the Willey and Martin company episodes as though the successful treks had never occurred. So no, I don’t agree that the Church is backing away from the handcart history nor that it should. 

In the history of aviation, There have been many disasters, yet we don’t discontinue flight travel because of them. 

As for the other things you listed, it is obvious you have a generally negative disposition about the Church of Jesus Christ and its past, but that does not justify a conclusion that the Church has any intention to “distance itself from its history.”

 

Nephi was given instructions on how to build an amazing perfect ship to cross the ocean...  I wonder why BY was not given instruction on how to build a proper hand cart?

Edited October 23, 2018 by changed

[Scott Lloyd]

1 hour ago, Kenngo1969 said:

Fair enough.  The fact remains that, insofar as I am aware, Francis Webster, along with his wife, remained faithful. 

No question about that. 

[Calm]

20 minutes ago, changed said:

 

Nephi was given instructions on how to build an amazing perfect ship to cross the ocean...  I wonder why BY was not given instruction on how to build a proper hand cart?

BY was a carpenter.  Unlikely he needed instruction.

https://history.lds.org/article/brigham-youngs-lathe?lang=eng

[Bernard Gui]

8 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

So you have  never heard "Well I am 7th generation Mormon......" as if one then knows more than one who is only 6th generation?  

Los Angeles area.

And then there are those who think  family history work is now VERY easy because all you do is log in and you get clues about your ancestors and temple names just waiting for  you.

How they get  those  destroyed Polish parish records  from Poland is pretty magic  I guess.  They must have time machines..... 

I suppose  Salt Lake City or Nauvoo was never carpet bombed....   

And all  those apps that show  what famous people  you are related to??   fergitaboutit! 

 

Still can’t find any records of my Grandpa Piotr after searching for 5 decades. 

[Scott Lloyd]

9 hours ago, Calm said:

BY was a carpenter.  Unlikely he needed instruction.

https://history.lds.org/article/brigham-youngs-lathe?lang=eng

President Young was not among those involved in the on-the-ground preparations for the Martin or Willey companies and did not hear the details until later. 

It’s so easy to find fault 160 years removed from the events and with limited knowledge of them. 

Edited October 23, 2018 by Scott Lloyd

[mfbukowski]

9 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

Still can’t find any records of my Grandpa Piotr after searching for 5 decades. 

I totally get it.

If they were born here it's pretty easy usually. If they were born there look out.

[mfbukowski]

11 hours ago, changed said:

 

When the point of the celestial kingdom is "together forever", there is no point for those without a family.  the LDS church does seem to worship ancestors - are very big on "who begat who", what your family line is ... it is part of racism - the obsession with genealogy.  

 

 

BY did not consider it a mistake... I agree death is not the worst fate... 

 

 

Nephi was given instructions on how to build an amazing perfect ship to cross the ocean...  I wonder why BY was not given instruction on how to build a proper hand cart?

So you don't have a family and those who do are therefore racists?

Just know that if you are here your body was made by two humans. The way they were then is not the way they will be in the future. You DO have a family.

[Calm]

Quote

 it is part of racism - the obsession with genealogy.  

Genealogy is a great way to process that one is connected to all of humanity, the antithesis of racism.

Edited October 23, 2018 by Calm

[changed]

On 10/23/2018 at 11:28 AM, mfbukowski said:

Just know that if you are here your body was made by two humans. The way they were then is not the way they will be in the future. You DO have a family.

Do you believe everyone will be saved in the Celestial kingdom?  If you do not believe that everyone will be saved, you cannot promise "together forever" for everyone.  ... my "together forever" is not going to happen in the C.K.

[mfbukowski]

3 hours ago, changed said:

Do you believe everyone will be saved in the Celestial kingdom?  If you do not believe that everyone will be saved, you cannot promise "together forever" for everyone.  ... my "together forever" is not going to happen in the C.K.

If you think that way, you are right! So change, Changed!  🙂

 

[mfbukowski]

On 10/23/2018 at 12:54 PM, Calm said:

Genealogy is a great way to process that one is connected to all of humanity, the antithesis of racism.

Man, you can say that again! When you see the hundreds- thousands of humans it took to make you a unique individual, all from far-away places with strange sounding names, it is in fact the antithesis of racism! We are literally all one family!

[Calm]

6 hours ago, changed said:

Do you believe everyone will be saved in the Celestial kingdom?  If you do not believe that everyone will be saved, you cannot promise "together forever" for everyone.  ... my "together forever" is not going to happen in the C.K.

Would you want people to be forced to live a lifestyle they didn't want to?  Wouldn't that be abusive?  Wouldn't you be happiest for them to be where they are happiest?

You have no way of knowing how your current family members will change over the rest of their lives and after death until judgment...which appears to be as long as needed for everyone to decide what they really want to be for the eternities.  Therefore, I think it is likely premature to be judging who is and isn't Celestial Kingdom bound, which is why we do proxy work for everyone.

Edited October 25, 2018 by Calm