Page 1 of 2
lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Wed Sep 28, 2022 8:07 pm
by Marcus
On the Mormon subreddit, an lds service missionary used the spiritual flair to bear his testimony, and then got into a discussion about the priesthood ban that ended in 1978.
I haven't read such blatant racism since Midgley posted stuff like this. Is this a troll? Is this indicative of lds youth today? Here are some excerpts:
[lds missionary]
I think it was because black people were so looked down upon back then that giving people with darker skin the priesthood would actually hurt the church more than it would help it so we had to wait until that wouldn't be the case
https://old.reddit.com/r/Mormon/comment ... y/iq674w4/
[response]
and that makes it ok? Do you think God was in favor of withholding blessings from Black people because it wouldn't be popular?
[lds missionary]
There have been times in the past when he had to hurt someone to help the majority when it was the only option. I don't know if you know the story of Nephi and Laban but Laban was withholding the gold plates from Nephi and his brothers and they tried and tried to get it from him but he kept withholding it and that meant that God eventually had to have Nephi kill Laban. I know that seems really drastic and unnecessary but Laban was refusing to do something that would help save many people since those plates were part of the scriptures that we have today. If Laban got to do what he wanted then he would be resisting the salvation of many people. It's better for one person to die than for an entire nation to not have the gospel and potentially not be saved because of it. There was so much scrutiny against black people back then that giving them the priesthood could mean that way more people would leave the church and then not be saved in the end because of it. That means heavenly father was choosing to have more people saved in The end by withholding the priesthood from some of his children for a while so more people would believe and be saved in the end. They can still receive the priesthood in the next life and one reason why we should believe in this life is because when we don't have a physical body it is a lot harder to change. We will be resurrected eventually but by that point it would be too late to change our ways because we would be resurrected and then it would be the last day and we would be judged by God.
https://old.reddit.com/r/Mormon/comment ... y/iq6dzdi/
[another response from the lds missionary]
I don't think that it was so much the reputation, more that so many people would walk away from the church because of black people getting the priesthood, since the world looked down upon black people more back then, that the churches view was more on the side of so many losing their way by walking away. We didn't want to keep the priesthood away, but it was choosing the majority. It was something that the church didn't want to do because we view everyone as equal but the church still chose the people. It was something that made the church look racist because back then members would have walked away if black people got the priesthood. It was a choice of waiting to receive the priesthood, and losing souls.
https://old.reddit.com/r/Mormon/comment ... y/iq933kn/
[lds missionary]
He doesn't play favorites with his children, I think if you looked up what the church has to say it would clear confusion but I'm sorry I do admit I don't know enough to clear your confusion very well here but the church could clear it up if you look up what they have to say. There's a lot of doctoring and it takes a lot of study to really understand the whole picture.
https://old.reddit.com/r/Mormon/comment ... y/iq6dcut/
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Wed Sep 28, 2022 8:51 pm
by drumdude
They're correct. The horrific story of the murder of Laban is one of the first things you learn about in the Book of Mormon. It teaches Mormons that even if you know something is morally wrong - God overrides your personal morality. And the leaders of the Mormon church are stand-ins for God.
Everything else follows. The blind unquestioning obedience to the church, and their racist/sexist/homophobic policies.
Mormons have to be very morally strong to stand up against this, and an 18 year old missionary who has only known Mormonism doesn't have that ability.
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Thu Sep 29, 2022 1:43 am
by Everybody Wang Chung
Incredible! Well, until the Church officially gives a reason for the ban, I guess members are free to believe and teach any kind of racists/bizarre explanations. Big fail for the church.
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Thu Sep 29, 2022 1:54 am
by Dr Exiled
Marcus wrote: ↑Wed Sep 28, 2022 8:07 pm
Is this a troll?
[lds missionary]
That means heavenly father ...
Maybe, given how "Under the Banner of Heaven" overused the term "heavenly father" to the point of it being grotesque, a way to make Mormons look like simpletons.
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Thu Sep 29, 2022 2:04 am
by Dr Moore
It could be a troll. Equating 150 years of the entire population of black Africans to Laban, whose head was cut off for the sake of Nephi’s future nation, wow. Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb.
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Thu Sep 29, 2022 2:09 am
by Moksha
I think the young missionary was saying, that a Church based on robbery/homicide needed a strong degree of racism for internal consistency. If you simply poured in sweetness and light, it would confuse everybody.
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Thu Sep 29, 2022 7:59 pm
by BeNotDeceived
Everybody Wang Chung wrote: ↑Thu Sep 29, 2022 1:43 am
Incredible! Well, until the Church officially gives a reason for the ban, I guess members are free to believe and teach any kind of racists/bizarre explanations. Big fail for the church.
The 'church' can't give an official explanation because they know it was all because Brigham Young was a racist and hated black skinned people. And the only reason the 'church' decided to give blacks the 'priesthood' in 1978 was due to the federal government threatening to seize its assets and revoke their tax-exempt status for racial discrimination if they didn't. But oh no, it was a 'revelation', showing that God really does care about all his children even though if that were the case, there would never have been a ban in the first place.
The mental gymnastics you have to do if you're TBM in order to make the religion work and justify everything.
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Thu Sep 29, 2022 10:02 pm
by huckelberry
Marcus wrote: ↑Wed Sep 28, 2022 8:07 pm
On the Mormon subreddit, an lds service missionary used the spiritual flair to bear his testimony, and then got into a discussion about the priesthood ban that ended in 1978.
I haven't read such blatant racism since Midgley posted stuff like this. Is this a troll? Is this indicative of lds youth today? Here are some excerpts:
[lds missionary]
I think it was because black people were so looked down upon back then that giving people with darker skin the priesthood would actually hurt the church more than it would help it so we had to wait until that wouldn't be the case
https://old.reddit.com/r/Mormon/comment ... y/iq6dcut/
I think bringing in as comparison the Laban thing is an embarrassingly poor argument. Actually the exchange starts out very close to the simple truth. Many white Mormons wanted to keep their distance from Negros. The missionary is stuck with the dubious idea that it was Gods plan. As a Mormon believer that is the corner he is stuck in.
It is a much nicer and less racist vision than what I heard in church growing up. There was then straight up racist ideology. True this missionary vision contains an assumption that God is prioritizing white rather than black converts. But what alternative line does the missionary have? I am not remembering the name but back some time on this discussion board there was some review of positions advanced by black LDS members. Their view was this same observation. whites were not ready. (perhaps softer on the idea that God was behind the timing)
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2022 1:41 am
by tapirrider
Either he is a troll, or
this
Re: lds missionary explains the priesthood ban
Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2022 2:05 pm
by dastardly stem
I've heard this explanation before or something like it. It is awful though. God gave the Mormons polygamy...well not just polygamy but a pretty extreme form where the highest rated member men have the most wives and the lowest were left with one...God refuses still to give women the priesthood...God fights all moves made by humans to adopt civil rights...and yet what really would have chased members away was God saying all races are equal?
Randy Bott, formerly of BYU, taught something that goes along these lines:
God has always been discriminatory” when it comes to whom he grants the authority of the priesthood, says Bott… Bott compares blacks with a young child prematurely asking for the keys to her father’s car, and explains that similarly until 1978, the Lord determined that blacks were not yet ready for the priesthood.
“What is discrimination?” Bott asks. “I think that is keeping something from somebody that would be a benefit for them, right? But what if it wouldn’t have been a benefit to them?” Bott says that the denial of the priesthood to blacks on Earth—although not in the afterlife—protected them from the lowest rungs of hell reserved for people who abuse their priesthood powers. “You couldn’t fall off the top of the ladder, because you weren’t on the top of the ladder. So, in reality the blacks not having the priesthood was the greatest blessing God could give them.”
https://religiondispatches.org/racist-r ... ntroversy/
On his view God was saving those restricted from getting the priesthood because if they were given it, they would have failed and sent to hell. On this young missionary's view God would be sending many white Mormons to hell if he had given the priesthood to black men. The poor whites would have ran from the Church if GOd did that. And whites are the majority...in America at least, or were at the time...and somehow everyone was shallow enough to see diversity as nothing but color of skin....
In a sense I agree with Everybody Wang Chung's assessment--as long as the Church leaves everyone to guess any ol' explanation will do. That's the whole point behind apologetics.