rcrocket wrote:...
Let's see, the "social monster" was picked up by the Reorganization, and he testified for JSIII before Congress leading to the Utah War. Seems your little sect thought a lot of him.
Or, as Joe Smith made him an apostle, we might say that the President
of the LDS Church thought a lot of him, John C. Bennett and other worthies
of the Nauvoo period. It was not the Reorganization that made William
a "special witness for Jesus Christ." William's private repentance was
accepted and that was it. He held no leadership position -- was not even
allowed to sit in a meeting of High Priests so long as Isaac Sheen headed
up that quorum.
The Reorganization did not exist when William opposed Deseret statehood
so his public statements had no connection to its incipient members -- as
good, bad or indifferent counsel.
There were certainly RLDS who knew very well what William's monstrous past
had been -- but his service on the side of the Union during the Civil War
appears to have driven the devil out of him -- at least there were no known
subsequent charges of fraud, child molestation, attempted seductions, etc.
Regarding your little newspaper article about Alvin and his father, it seems you are intent on playing as the fool the victim, not the perpetrator, in the story.
Imagine a person who walked into your house today, claiming to hear
disembodied voices, telling him what to do -- who claimed to hold the
keys to the final dispensation of the Christian gospel, who wanted to talk
to you about the time his daddy dug up the body of his elder brother and
how his own son is an inmate in a mental institution.
Perhaps
that is just the sort of person you would automatically feel good
about, believe, and place your confidence in. But would you expect that
none of the rest of us would take the trouble to question his sanity?
UD
.