LDSToronto wrote:And PS - I love the light Romney has shed on the church. We all knew the place was full of douchebags, now the rest of the world can see it, too.
H.
With wins for Romney tonight, I think it's a guarantee he'll be the nominee. I really hope they start to focus on the priesthood ban. There is no easy or good way to answer for it.
Doctor Scratch wrote:Who *is* an authority if not a highly-rated BYU religion prof?
The LDS clergy who have the word "authority" in their title.
If that's really your answer, Joseph, then I think you should tell that to the reporter. Say, "This guy has no authority. The only people qualified to weigh in on this matter are the General Authorities." And do you really mean all the GAs? Or just the top 15? Or just Pres. Monson? If they were to let Packer respond, and he said something like this, what would you do?
That's really the consequence of what you're suggesting here. Is that really what you want? The is "The Mormon Moment"; if you start nuking BYU profs, and insisting that the mainstream media should disregard their comments, what will that do to the Church? What will everyone think?
"[I]f, while hoping that everybody else will be honest and so forth, I can personally prosper through unethical and immoral acts without being detected and without risk, why should I not?." --Daniel Peterson, 6/4/14
The statement as quoted in the blog is not racist. There is nothing that says or implies that because blacks have blacks skin, they were not ready for the priesthood. Bott would have to be questioned further as to why he thinks they were not ready. Perhaps he would point to some of their general cultural aspects. Perhaps he would say that it was everyone else who was not ready. Perhaps something else.
bcspace wrote:The statement as quoted in the blog is not racist. There is nothing that says or implies that because blacks have blacks skin, they were not ready for the priesthood. Bott would have to be questioned further as to why he thinks they were not ready. Perhaps he would point to some of their general cultural aspects. Perhaps he would say that it was everyone else who was not ready. Perhaps something else.
Not racist? Are you kidding me?
Here is what the article states:
In his office, religion professor Randy Bott explains a possible theological underpinning of the ban. According to Mormon scriptures, the descendants of Cain, who killed his brother, Abel, “were black.” One of Cain’s descendants was Egyptus, a woman Mormons believe was the namesake of Egypt. She married Ham, whose descendants were themselves cursed and, in the view of many Mormons, barred from the priesthood by his father, Noah. Bott points to the Mormon holy text the Book of Abraham as suggesting that all of the descendants of Ham and Egyptus were thus black and barred from the priesthood.
"God has always been discriminatory” when it comes to whom he grants the authority of the priesthood, says Bott, the BYU theologian. He quotes Mormon scripture that states that the Lord gives to people “all that he seeth fit.” 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.”
bcspace wrote:The statement as quoted in the blog is not racist. There is nothing that says or implies that because blacks have blacks skin, they were not ready for the priesthood. Bott would have to be questioned further as to why he thinks they were not ready. Perhaps he would point to some of their general cultural aspects. Perhaps he would say that it was everyone else who was not ready. Perhaps something else.
Racism doesn't have to be based on skin color. Sometimes racism is based on culture or ethnicity.
The priesthood ban is obviously racist, and LDST identifies the crucial issue here--to the vast gentile population, whether or not Bott is a GA is irrelevant, he's an expert in Mormonism paid by LDS to teach at an LDS-run university.
However, even with all that, I hope the bit about "Egyptus" doesn't get lost in the din. To anyone with any actual knowledge of history or anthropology or linguistics, the nonsense about "Egyptus" is every bit as much of a smoking gun as Facsimile #3 or the horses and chariots. I used to be against Romney getting the nomination, both because I intensely dislike his arrogant attitude and because of his uncomfortable relationship to the White Horse Prophecy, but now I think it will be a good thing to get as much media exposure as possible on his "religion."
Oh for shame, how the mortals put the blame on us gods, for they say evils come from us, but it is they, rather, who by their own recklessness win sorrow beyond what is given... Zeus (1178 BC)
The UN does not define “racism”; however, it does define “racial discrimination”: According to the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the term "racial discrimination" shall mean any distinction, exclusion, restriction, or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin that has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.
I thought this was a good definition of racial discrimination.
~Those who benefit from the status quo always attribute inequities to the choices of the underdog.~Ann Crittenden ~The Goddess is not separate from the world-She is the world and all things in it.~
In his office, religion professor Randy Bott explains a possible theological underpinning of the ban. According to Mormon scriptures, the descendants of Cain, who killed his brother, Abel, “were black.” One of Cain’s descendants was Egyptus, a woman Mormons believe was the namesake of Egypt. She married Ham, whose descendants were themselves cursed and, in the view of many Mormons, barred from the priesthood by his father, Noah. Bott points to the Mormon holy text the Book of Abraham as suggesting that all of the descendants of Ham and Egyptus were thus black and barred from the priesthood.
"God has always been discriminatory” when it comes to whom he grants the authority of the priesthood, says Bott, the BYU theologian. He quotes Mormon scripture that states that the Lord gives to people “all that he seeth fit.” 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.”
Can't possibly be racist since the ban did not come about because of black skin in his hypothesis.