Popular BYU Randy Bott Takes Heat for Comments

[_SteelHead]

A little more. For most American members this topic is purely academic, for me it is a part of my family.

The Brazilian issue is due to the systematic destruction of all documents in regards to slavery after the abolition of slavery in Brazil. The government directed burning of papers, records and genealogies and encouraged the intermingling of the people. Performing genealogy can be down right difficult under these circumstances as documents pre 1880 are gone. 80% or better of all people in Brazil are of mixed blood.

Let's perform a little thought experiment.

Let's say the priesthood ban is still in place and my two sons are grown, ordained in the Melchizedek priesthood and all that. In fact let's say one is now a sealer in a temple somewhere.

I, as a dutiful and faithful little member, clipping along and doing my family's genealogy then suddenly discover that my wife is in fact a long lost descendant of "Zumbi Dos Palmares".

Upon reporting this to my leaders, my sons are now no longer able to perform priesthood ordinances.

What happens to the validity of the ordinances that they previously performed? Guess what! They are still valid.

From LDS.org:

Ordinances of the priesthood are valid if they are performed by authorized priesthood bearers in the prescribed manner.
.
.
.
the ordinance does not become invalid if someone involved is unworthy at the time he participates. The sanctity of the ordinance is violated, but not the validity. If the partaker is worthy and sincere, all the possible blessings and benefits will be his.

What can we conclude; if the ordinances that they performed in good faith are still valid, but they can no longer perform because they by birth are denied this authority?.... What a conundrum!

If we can turn a blind eye to such, what was the point of the ban in the first place?

[_Madison54]

Can anyone answer a couple of questions?

We know that blacks had the priesthood initially in the church....then at some point, that changed. So, something happened to put this ban in place. Therefore, how can the church now state that "we don't know why"?

Also...all the apologists keep harping that this is not racial but is a matter of lineage. So, when those members were denied the priesthood prior to 1978, was their lineage checked (ie. their genealogy, etc.) or did they just go by the color of their skin when denying them?

[_Tobin]

Can anyone answer a couple of questions?
We know that blacks had the priesthood initially in the church....then at some point, that changed. So, something happened to put this ban in place. Therefore, how can the church now state that "we don't know why"?
Also...all the apologists keep harping that this is not racial but is a matter of lineage. So, when those members were denied the priesthood prior to 1978, was their lineage checked (ie. their genealogy, etc.) or did they just go by the color of their skin when denying them?

Brigham Young happened. I squarely point the blame at him for doing this and denying women their proper role in the priesthood as well (something that has yet to be fixed by the Church).

[_MsJack]

Hi Maklelan,

It's good to see you again! I'm sorry to see that this thread has gone and grown 4-5 pages since I last checked it. I've been so busy as of late.

Anyways, you said:

Jack, I disagree with one of the comments from your blog post. You state, "those pre-1978 rationales for the priesthood ban were never recanted by the church, and Randy Bott is hardly out of line for continuing to believe in things that former prophets and apostles taught." This is untrue. The church has never proclaimed in any kind of official capacity that this or that explanation is formally repudiated, but leaders have denounced those rationales since the 70s.

You agree with me that the church has never recanted these sentiments in "any kind of official capacity," yet you think that what I wrote was untrue?

Even before 1978 the church claimed that the exact rationale for the ban was unknown. From a 1969 First Presidency statement:

From the beginning of this dispensation, Joseph Smith and all succeeding presidents of the Church have taught that Negroes, while spirit children of a common Father, and the progeny of our earthly parents Adam and Eve, were not yet to receive the priesthood, for reasons which we believe are known to God, but which He has not made fully known to man.

This states that the reasons had not been made fully known to man. Though it does hint at the "We just don't know" response currently favored by the church, it does not go so far as to declare that the former reasons articulated by church leaders were invalid. One could read this and decide that the other reasons articulated by past church leaders formed part of the reason but not all.

Concerning Bruce R. McConkie's speech to CES employees in 1978, you left out a significant part of the citation:

We have read these passages and their associated passages for many years. We have seen what the words say and have said to ourselves, “Yes, it says that, but we must read out of it the taking of the gospel and the blessings of the temple to the Negro people, because they are denied certain things.” There are statements in our literature by the early Brethren which we have interpreted to mean that the Negroes would not receive the priesthood in mortality. I have said the same things, and people write me letters and say, “You said such and such, and how is it now that we do such and such?” And all I can say to that is that it is time disbelieving people repented and got in line and believed in a living, modern prophet. Forget everything that I have said, or what President Brigham Young or President George Q. Cannon or whomsoever has said in days past that is contrary to the present revelation. We spoke with a limited understanding and without the light and knowledge that now has come into the world.

http://speeches.BYU.edu/reader/reader.php?id=11017

McConkie, Cannon and Young were all church leaders who had taught that black people would not ever receive the priesthood in mortality; members were asking what to make of those leaders' statements since the 1978 policy change had obviously made them wrong. The immediate context suggests that that is what McConkie was telling people to forget about, not necessarily the rationales that were articulated for denying blacks the priesthood.

I agree that the statements from Elder Oaks and Elder Holland come closer to recanting what past leaders taught and calling those teachings wrong. However, a Deseret News article and a PBS interview aren't particularly strong venues for recanting things that were once proclaimed from the pulpit of General Conference. They don't even show up in searches of LDS.org. I think that if I tried to give force to something that an LDS leader said in one of those venues, those who disagreed with me would play the "not-doctrine" card in a heartbeat. Frankly, the church has just got to be more specific and more official if it really wants members to let go of what former leaders said.

In regards to Bott, I simply cannot fault him for believing in things that his leaders have taught in the past and never formally recanted. Nor can I fault him too much for reading the Book of Abraham as a reference to the "curse of Cain" doctrine. LDS scholars are correct that the text does not explicitly state that it applies to blacks, but it was written in the 1830s, when the Christian world widely believed that blacks were the descendants of Cain, and that is how it was interpreted by Mormons for generations. Seeing it as a reference to blacks is a pretty natural reading of the text. His only crime is being rather naïve in not knowing how much repeating this material to a national newspaper would embarrass Mormons.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that he's the John D. Lee of this issue, but I just cannot respect the idea of applying anger and outrage to Bott that has never been applied to LDS leaders of the past who taught very similar things. To do so is to treat a symptom while allowing the disease to go unchecked. I think the reality is that speaking out against a BYU professor is safe, while speaking out against former LDS leaders is "ark-steadying," and that's why Bott is taking the heat.

[_maklelan]

So the hymn "Follow the Prophet" should be changed to "Follow the Social Norm"?

Not at all. Mormons are responsible to seek the guidance of God, even in determining the legitimacy of the counsel of the church leadership. That social climates are going to be influential in the whole process is inevitable, but that doesn't mean anyone has to throw their hands up and abandon the search.

[_Kishkumen]

I wouldn't go so far as to say that he's the John D. Lee of this issue, but I just cannot respect the idea of applying anger and outrage to Bott that has never been applied to LDS leaders of the past who taught very similar things. To do so is to treat a symptom while allowing the disease to go unchecked. I think the reality is that speaking out against a BYU professor is safe, while speaking out against former LDS leaders is "ark-steadying," and that's why Bott is taking the heat.

Well said.

[_SteelHead]

Brigham Young instituted the ban.

Prior to the 78 revocation, missionaries in Brazil were taught to look for certain characteristic, and discontinue teaching families they suspected of black lineage. They also asked indirect questions about family heritage and genealogy.

All the same, accidents happened, and people were baptized and ordained to offices in the priesthood, who later discovered they were of black descent (generally through the pursuit of their genealogy). The priesthood was revoked from them, but the ordinances they performed were allowed to stand.

[_Madison54]

Tobin,
I agree with your answer above....thanks.

Now, can you (or anyone) answer this question?

All the apologists keep harping that this is not racial but is a matter of lineage. So, when those members were denied the priesthood prior to 1978, was their lineage checked (ie. their genealogy, etc.) or did they just go by the color of their skin when denying them?

[_harmony]

Prior to the 78 revocation, missionaries in Brazil were taught to look for certain characteristic, and discontinue teaching families they suspected of black lineage. They also asked indirect questions about family heritage and genealogy.

Well, it's much easier to discriminate against women. When they can't show the missionaries a penis, it's obvious they don't qualify.

[Guest]

Brigham Young instituted the ban.

Prior to the 78 revocation, missionaries in Brazil were taught to look for certain characteristic, and discontinue teaching families they suspected of black lineage. They also asked indirect questions about family heritage and genealogy.

All the same, accidents happened, and people were baptized and ordained to offices in the priesthood, who later discovered they were of black descent (generally through the pursuit of their genealogy). The priesthood was revoked from them, but the ordinances they performed were allowed to stand.

I think the reluctance on the part of the Church to acknowledge this and abandon another of BY's doctrines is because it was institutionalized and so many later prophets of the Church shared in his racist views which taints them as well. They don't yet realize (or wish to ackowledge) that the Church leaders are not as they claim (prophets, seers, and revelators in the sense that Joseph Smith was) and merely corporate caretakers of Mormonism. In that capacity they have substituted divine revelation with their own biased and mistaken views. This is being felt acutely now in many areas, not only in this issue. Unless and until they return to their roots and seek real experiences with God and real revelation, this institutional decay will continue.