The Second Apostolic Coup: November 5th, 2015

[_Symmachus]

However, this was not always the case. The leaders were emboldened by their earlier success fighting ERA, I suppose. But there is also a long history of not doing these kinds of things, and the general Mormon inclination has been more libertarian, so to speak. Usually Mormons were a live and let live kind of group and probably so because they wanted to be left alone to live their religion.

So, to point to the 1990s to the present as indicative of the Mormon character or its institutional character is somewhat shortsighted. The leaders made a decided effort to mainstream theologically (on the surface, at least) and join the culture wars at a particular point in time. Those efforts set off the subsequent chain of decisions and actions that landed us here. They were not inevitable. The apostles most involved in these efforts from 1990 on are probably the same three Anderson referred to.

I don't want to derail your response before you have given it, but I just want to clarify in case I wasn't clear that I think the 1990s were only the beginning of this campaign. The point I was making about continuity, though, was that the LDS pretension to political power has such a long history that it is in fact difficult to put it aside, and that this campaign is yet another instance of that will to power; it is so deeply enmeshed in the Church's history that it is hard not to see it as a function of the Church itself. It is not like a Methodist church or any other protestant sect in the scope of the claims that it was making as early as the 1830s and still makes today, nor in the methods that it used and continues to use in pursuing them. 1890 set the Church back and forced it to re-channel its political ambitions, but you can draw a line from the Great Basin Kingdom to the prohibition fight to opposition to the New Deal to the anti-communist crusades to the ERA fight to Proposition 8. But even in their own backyard in the 1940s and 1950s they were working with the state to combat polygamists, who were not doing anything to them other than being related to them (sometimes literally: the Woolleys were Spencer W. Kimball's cousins! He himself of course was Joseph Smith's nephew through Helen Mar, so even a leader as modern as Kimball was still deeply connected to 19th century polygamy, and Gordon B. Hinckley's own father may have been a post-manifesto polygamist though those rumors are all based on circumstantial evidence).

I'm not sure I agree, then, that Church has had a live-and-let-live attitude. I would see the appointment of someone like Oaks in 1984, already a distinguished jurist who had twice been short-listed for the United States Supreme Court, in that light. He had had no previous Church experience in the hierarchy (e.g. seventy or what have you) and was already had a lifetime appointment to the Utah Supreme Court. They were gearing up for something by calling a guy like that into the Quorum of the Twelve.

I'd wonder how many members living prior to the ban would have disagreed with this. In the late 40s when Lowry Nelson started questioning the leadership and pushing the Church on this, the Church leaders couldn't conceive of making the change it seems to me. If say, the Church changed upside down on the LGBTQ issues in a couple years, and two men sealed together into eternity became a practice, perhaps their families become less biological, and more adoptive. I don't see a collapse nor incoherence if so. It's simply an opening up. "oh wait...maybe two gods having sex and conceiving of a child doesn't produce a spirit baby? Well...I'll be"

Perhaps the notion that there are no spirit babies at all, but spirits are formed and sex in eternity, though may happen, loses it's usefulness in creating billions of spirits. As it is many in the Church may argue, today, that God and his wife or wives didn't have sex to make 200 billion or so spirit babies.

There is a slight distinction, though: it's a little unclear whether the Church has ever really renounced the doctrine used to justify the policy. The 2015 essay says it does, but who wrote that? There has been no reference to it in any speeches by the authorities of the Church. Probably the Church would rather just forget it that it ever happened, for as Bushman said: "it brings into question all of the prophet’s inspiration.”

But it can afford to forget it because it was an administrative and political issue that merely had a theological overlay. Pre-1978 thought was pretty clear, I think, that the ban was a temporal one having to do with the pre-existence and that it would be lifted when the god saw fit, which means that they thought it could be lifted. Even Brigham Young said as much when he first introduced the ban. Mormon theology wasn't predicated on excluding black people, even in Brigham Young's understanding of it. That is why someone like David O. McKay didn't even know about it until he was traveling in South Africa as an apostle.

But Mormon theology is predicated on heterosexuality. The whole innovation of Joseph Smith was to claim that human life is patterned on a divine template, predicated above all on god's male sexuality. It's different from the priesthood ban because the doctrine of eternal marriage is not a theological leavening added to a political and cultural policy. It wasn't invented whole-cloth to justify the political campaign against gay marriage.

I'm not saying its impossible to reinvent Mormon doctrine, which is the ideological glue that binds the members to the institution, but it's not going to be easy. Israelite religion abandoned the temple out of forced necessity but the religion constructed from the ashes didn't take shape for hundreds of years and after the serious intellectual struggle of which every page of the Talmud is witness; Classical Christianity managed to make Jesus into a God while maintaining a semblance of monotheism but only with centuries of schism and violence punctuated with moments of sheer intellectual brilliance. My response to a post from some weeks back in which I suggested that Mormonism will need an Aquinas-like moment at some point was about this: of course Mormonism can be remade, but it's not as simple as someone saying X, Y, or Z and calling it revelation when it's something as fundamental to Mormon identity as the divine pattern of heterosexuality.

The Church is not interested in doing this kind of thing, even though ostensibly theology should be a church's primary province of activity. Yet it still tacitly endorses the polygamy for Christ's sake. But getting into politics? No problem.

[_Kishkumen]

Just to add something in support of Stem’s argument, the idea of the conception of “spirit babies” post-dates Joseph Smith and belongs, If I recall correctly, to the late 19th century. Adoption theology was much stronger in 19th century Mormonism than it is today, but even today people sealed to adopted parents are considered the children of those parents. The late 20th and early 21st century LDS Church chose to emphasize the nuclear family with heterosexual parents, but the 19th century Church allowed full grown adults to be sealed to other adults they were neither married to nor related to by blood. I add this to show that there is a lot more flexibility in both theology and practice than current teachings would lead one to imagine. The LDS Church of today has chosen, in fact, to adopt the language and concepts of hate groups in preference to its own historical teachings. So, I don’t interpret today’s LDS Church as representative of core Mormon doctrine in any essential way. Indeed, its current positions verges on aberration and heresy, so to speak.

On the topic of “will to power,” I agree with Symmachus inasmuch as Mormons sought to establish the Kingdom of God. I cannot take seriously, however, the idea that its political cooperation with Catholics and Evangelicals is simply an extension of the same, and, even if one were to argue that it is in some way, I would still maintain that the vast majority of Mormons have harbored a live and let live attitude for the most part. Mormons have been taught free agency and to let others worship according to the dictates of their own conscience. The LDS Church has never committed to the extreme of seeking to outlaw abortion. The extent to which the Church has moved closer to radical Christian fundamentalists is a reflection, in my view, of the cultural influence of fundamentalism in the larger culture, not an inherently and irreparably Mormon phenomenon.

Maybe the time of a milder Mormonism is past. There was a window between, say, 1910 and 1980, in which Mormons and the LDS Church were decidedly not fundamentalist or especially strident in politics outside Utah. My impression is that really started to change after opposition to ERA was a success and common cause was made with the fundamentalist initiatives of other Christian groups. The backlash from Prop 8 put the LDS Church on the defensive, so now it has decided to be more draconian in its own sphere.

But, I would agree that the seeds of theocracy were always there. Less expected to me was the way this was reactivated and changed by their making common cause with other theocrats. Now this is no longer about waiting for last-days events that would demand a withdrawal into a theocratic utopia; it is instead about forcing outsiders to live a certain way to avoid divine punishment.

That’s how I see it anyway.

[_Symmachus]

Just to add something in support of Stem’s argument, the idea of the conception of “spirit babies” post-dates Joseph Smith and belongs, If I recall correctly, to the late 19th century. Adoption theology was much stronger in 19th century Mormonism than it is today, but even today people sealed to adopted parents are considered the children of those parents. The late 20th and early 21st century LDS Church chose to emphasize the nuclear family with heterosexual parents, but the 19th century Church allowed full grown adults to be sealed to other adults they were neither married to nor related to by blood. I add this to show that there is a lot more flexibility in both theology and practice than current teachings would lead one to imagine. The LDS Church of today has chosen, in fact, to adopt the language and concepts of hate groups in preference to its own historical teachings. So, I don’t interpret today’s LDS Church as representative of core Mormon doctrine in any essential way. Indeed, its current positions verges on aberration and heresy, so to speak.

Flexibility, yes, but that doesn't mean there aren't firm boundaries. Perhaps I should study that more and look closely at the primary evidence, but I think this "law of adoption" line is misleading. The point of the law of adoption, as I understand it, was largely to create and reinforce centers of power within the priesthood hierarchy in this life that would have authority in the next, or to effect adoption into an already existing family for those who didn't have one in Utah. That is the way I remember it portrayed in secondary literature that I have read with the exception of Quinn's Same Sex Dynamics, written at time when gay marriage started to become an issue of concern within Mormonism, which is very telling. This line of reasoning depends on analogy, but making an analogy between adoptive sealing and modern same-sex marriage in terms of Mormon theology is bit like saying the law of consecration might make Mormons open to communism, even though they share only a vague and superficial similarity. Similarities are always easy to spot, but it is the differences that tell you the nature of a thing. I don’t see how the practice and theology of adoptions as historically practiced and understood open a space for same sex relationships, especially for women.

As for the analogy with legal adoption today, well, yes that shows that genetic material is not the only criterion that the Church uses to define a family. But it does have criteria, and those criteria are informed by doctrinal assertions and by assumptions that have only acquired a doctrinal expression like the Proclamation recently because the wider culture has shifted. I find the argument that the Church has only recently become obsessed with the nuclear family a little ridiculous: well, obviously when everyone took it for granted that the family was defined in terms of a heterosexual union the Church didn't feel the need to say anything about it, nor did anyone else. But it is telling that the kind of family that Church advocated at its most radical was not opposed to the nuclear family but rather the intensification of it.

On the topic of “will to power,” I agree with Symmachus inasmuch as Mormons sought to establish the Kingdom of God. I cannot take seriously, however, the idea that its political cooperation with Catholics and Evangelicals is simply an extension of the same, and, even if one were to argue that it is in some way, I would still maintain that the vast majority of Mormons have harbored a live and let live attitude for the most part. Mormons have been taught free agency and to let others worship according to the dictates of their own conscience. The LDS Church has never committed to the extreme of seeking to outlaw abortion. The extent to which the Church has moved closer to radical Christian fundamentalists is a reflection, in my view, of the cultural influence of fundamentalism in the larger culture, not an inherently and irreparably Mormon phenomenon.

Maybe the time of a milder Mormonism is past. There was a window between, say, 1910 and 1980, in which Mormons and the LDS Church were decidedly not fundamentalist or especially strident in politics outside Utah. My impression is that really started to change after opposition to ERA was a success and common cause was made with the fundamentalist initiatives of other Christian groups. The backlash from Prop 8 put the LDS Church on the defensive, so now it has decided to be more draconian in its own sphere.

But, I would agree that the seeds of theocracy were always there. Less expected to me was the way this was reactivated and changed by their making common cause with other theocrats. Now this is no longer about waiting for last-days events that would demand a withdrawal into a theocratic utopia; it is instead about forcing outsiders to live a certain way to avoid divine punishment.

Two things.

First, I don't think they have all that much in common with the evangelicals, though there is probably much overlap with Catholics. I hope I have used my words carefully, but I have said that what crossed the line for me was not that the Church was opposed to gay marriage or gay people—not opinions I share, but organizations are free to have their own opinions without my having to care about them—but that they were willing to use that issue to advance their own political agenda, which is, namely to preserve their state within states (more on that) on their own terms. I hope the subtlety of this view can grasped and appreciated, even if it is not persuasive to you.

Unlike the evangelicals, I don't think the Church is out to abolish gay marriage or make homosexuality illegal as an end in itself. To that extent, I agree that the Church generally has a live-and-let-live approach, but they don't where their own interests are concerned, and what I'm saying is that the Church is involved not because they've been infected by crude bigotry (although there surely is some of that too) but because they perceive their own interests are involved (only, they call their interests "moral issues," a sleight of hand that Oaks himself has openly discussed and defended).

I think the Church would be indifferent to gay marriage if the legal regimes of the United States and other western countries were structured differently, but they have a fear, which I don't think is entirely unjustified, that the Church will be forced to yield on same-sex marriage or risk an attack on the kingdom of god they have built up. It may preach any theology it wishes, but marriage is a civil affair, and that invites civil authority. Courts in the United States (but not other countries) have generally been deferential to religion for various reasons, but there is no reason to suppose that that will always be the case, and that friendly environment began showing signs of shifting in the 1970s and onward (and Oaks exprssed alarm about this in the 1980s, even on a case involving school prayer in which some Mormons were forced to join in prayer directed by non-Mormons—but the Church was opposed to their case and refused to file an amicus brief for the Mormon plaintiffs!). This is especially so as courts grant more and more leeway to adminsitrative bodies in determining what the law is (e.g. Chevron deference; it's not the conservatives that make me think this but liberal legal scholars like Bruce Ackerman and Adrian Vermeule). From that perspective, I think the Church, under the counsel of someone like Oaks, who has been discussing these issues as they pertain to religion since the 1960s, has simply gone on the offensive rather than risk another 1890 even on a smaller scale. Much like a state —a kingdom, if you prefer—it’s a question of sovereignty. And if 1890 seems distant to you, just recall that one of Dallin Oaks' colleagues when he first got into the Quorum of the 12 had actually met Wilford Woodruff and that most of the members of the Quorum of the 12 until the 1990s had parents and certainly grandparents who experienced what the Church was like before the Manifesto. As an institutional memory, that was practically yesterday.

This leads me to my second point: the Manifesto was an attempt to save the kingdom of god, but they've never stopped building it, so I don’t see why you say “sought.” I think for a lot of members, certainly for myself when I was a member, this was a kind of metaphor and a vehicle for the the aspiration for some future millennial political order. But I don't think the Church leaders see it that way at all. It is very literal for them (the Mormon Stories episodes with Roger Hendrix really bring some of that out). The problem is that our conceptions of "kingdom of god" as a literal thing are very narrow, a state with control over territory—the Church doesn't have that (and doesn't aspire to), so therefore it must be metaphorical. But in my view, though, the LDS Church after 1890 became much more like the Roman Catholic Church, which, despite its total loss of territory by the end of the 19th century, had found ways to be a state within a state in every country where it operates, complete with its own system for administering family law for its members, shielding its own agents from the laws of the various states in which it operated to the extent that it could, and of course accruing power in more modern forms. It is still the kingdom it has always been. The LDS Church's kingdom is quite vast, actually, it's just that it's primarily financial rather than territorial, but given that one man is in charge of it all, the word "kingdom," if not fully literal, is not a mere metaphor either.

I don't doubt that the leaders, like the members, believe it's a force for good—and of course maybe it is on balance, by comparison with, say, Exxon Mobile—so it is understandable that they want to expand it as much as possible and to protect it. I see the attack on same-sex marriage as an offensive strategy to protect their kingdom of god. I think the November 2015 policy and Proposition 8 both serve that end, but the one is an internal matter that involves vanishingly few people and whose main offense is symbolic, while the other was an out and out attack that is explicable in terms of the institution’s history, as I’ve been arguing, but went too far.

The question is: how to explain that attack? It seems that for you, unless I'm not reading you right, it's just plain bigotry that found expression in a war over culture and common cause with evangelicals, even though it was suppressed before, during the “milder Mormonism" you perceive. I think what gives you the impression that it was different in the past is that there were no perceived threats to their kingdom of god during the years you point to, and those were also the years in which the Church was least able to go on offense (coming close to insolvency during the McKay era) in dealing with any threats.

I'm sorry to go on at such length—Kevensting must be losing it—but it seemed to me that my view was coming off to you as slightly deranged. It does deviate from the general narrative in some senses, but all I’m doing is taking people like Oaks at their word—building the kingdom of god in real sense, not as a metaphor, and waging a battle over the freedom of religious institutions—and trying to understand what they mean by putting their words into a historical perspective that I hope is sufficiently informed.

[_Kishkumen]

Flexibility, yes, but that doesn't mean there aren't firm boundaries. Perhaps I should study that more and look closely at the primary evidence, but I think this "law of adoption" line is misleading. The point of the law of adoption, as I understand it, was largely to create and reinforce centers of power within the priesthood hierarchy in this life that would have authority in the next, or to effect adoption into an already existing family for those who didn't have one in Utah. That is the way I remember it portrayed in secondary literature that I have read with the exception of Quinn's Same Sex Dynamics, written at time when gay marriage started to become an issue of concern within Mormonism, which is very telling. This line of reasoning depends on analogy, but making an analogy between adoptive sealing and modern same-sex marriage in terms of Mormon theology is bit like saying the law of consecration might make Mormons open to communism, even though they share only a vague and superficial similarity. Similarities are always easy to spot, but it is the differences that tell you the nature of a thing. I don’t see how the practice and theology of adoptions as historically practiced and understood open a space for same sex relationships, especially for women.

As for the analogy with legal adoption today, well, yes that shows that genetic material is not the only criterion that the Church uses to define a family. But it does have criteria, and those criteria are informed by doctrinal assertions and by assumptions that have only acquired a doctrinal expression like the Proclamation recently because the wider culture has shifted. I find the argument that the Church has only recently become obsessed with the nuclear family a little ridiculous: well, obviously when everyone took it for granted that the family was defined in terms of a heterosexual union the Church didn't feel the need to say anything about it, nor did anyone else. But it is telling that the kind of family that Church advocated at its most radical was not opposed to the nuclear family but rather the intensification of it.

So, I think it is important to identify the question. The question for me is not whether adoption theology already allowed for gay marriage. That would be absurd, in my view. I don't see how it would be possible for Joseph Smith, who seems not to have had homosexual identity as part of his explicit discourse, to have conceived of gay marriage. That is not the question. The question for me is whether there is something about Mormon theology that excludes the possibility of gay marriage, and I don't see that there is. It is only when one looks to the Brigham Young era for an understanding of Mormonism, instead of Joseph Smith, that one finds a hardening and literalization of the doctrine in a way that would seem to exclude the possibility for good. But Brigham Young's central theological speculation was ultimately rejected in the early 20th century, so I don't see the need to take a Brighamite view of Mormonism as its fixed and unalterable identity.

Secondly, I would not view Mormon polygamy to be an intensification of the nuclear family, at least not as I see the nuclear family. The traditional nuclear family is defined by its core of two married, heterosexual parents in an (ideally) exclusive relationship. Mormon polygamy was not an intensification of that relationship at all, but a transgression of its boundaries in order to weave different families together for the purpose of salvation as much as procreation. This is not the Western family at all, really. When Joseph Smith approached others with the idea of contracting polygamous marriages, the promise was salvation for the family (as joined to other families in the eternities), not a more intense monogamous, nuclear-family experience.

If there is a concern for the salvation of the family, then Mormonism must accommodate all of its members. It must confront a new reality in a productive way.

The question is: how to explain that attack? It seems that for you, unless I'm not reading you right, it's just plain bigotry that found expression in a war over culture and common cause with evangelicals, even though it was suppressed before, during the “milder Mormonism" you perceive. I think what gives you the impression that it was different in the past is that there were no perceived threats to their kingdom of god during the years you point to, and those were also the years in which the Church was least able to go on offense (coming close to insolvency during the McKay era) in dealing with any threats.

I'm sorry to go on at such length—Kevensting must be losing it—but it seemed to me that my view was coming off to you as slightly deranged. It does deviate from the general narrative in some senses, but all I’m doing is taking people like Oaks at their word—building the kingdom of god in real sense, not as a metaphor, and waging a battle over the freedom of religious institutions—and trying to understand what they mean by putting their words into a historical perspective that I hope is sufficiently informed.

Hey, Symmachus, this guy is always delighted to read every word you post. Don't let the bastards get you down, as the old saying goes.

I am aware of everything you say about the "Kingdom," and I do think that guys like Oaks are fully invested in and fighting for a very literal, viable Kingdom in the now. I just don't think this is a widely held perspective, even in Church leadership. Oaks belongs to a personality cult. Most everyone else in the LDS Church is not aware that they are. That includes the leadership. You can't really sustain a business operation of this type on pristine charisma. This one is sustained by accountants and lawyers. Yeah, there are the guys like Oaks who have nightmares about the assassination of Joseph Smith, and then there are the many people (penetrating the highest levels of leadership) who consider themselves Christian in a milquetoast way. I have heard of numerous interviews for BYU faculty positions in which the Seventy interviewing the candidate said something about having a low-key testimony.

Even the word Kingdom is interpreted in different ways, and the idea that the Kingdom is both present and absent at the same time leaves a lot of room for interpretation.

Yeah, I do get the part about going on the offensive to protect the LDS Church from having to accept gay marriage. And, yes, I think that the LDS Church made its devil's bargain partly for this reason. This is where the culturally conservative accountants and the wild-eyed cult members like Oaks meet in the middle. What we all fight over is the definition of us. A fundamentalist Mormon like Oaks with his celestial wives is fighting for his patriarchal godhood on the righthand of Joseph Smith. Others have a more expansive view of what Mormonism means. You can say that Oaks is right, but this is akin to me to an originalist reading of the Constitution, and I just don't have that much respect for this modernist approach to the past.

Anyhow, I see where you are coming from, and I think you have a strong argument. Still, I think that the soul of an organization is something the people in it fight to define. And, despite the power of men such as Oaks within the LDS Church, I don't believe time is on their side. While I cannot be a part of what is going on in the LDS Church, I try to understand what it is that keeps others going, and I would like to think it is more than misguided progressivism. Hopefully their reasons are more sophisticated and historically grounded than imposing their liberal values on Mormonism. I do think that there are Mormons on both sides of the ideological divide who do exactly this. I think it is also interesting that Mormons entered the culture wars at exactly the time when more Protestant converts were filling their ranks. Many sought a more reliably conservative church and thought they found one in Mormonism. They were only too happy to pick up the fight. But they also had little understanding of what was going on in Oaks' head.

[_orangganjil]

This entire thread has been wonderful. What a gem! Thank you.

[_Symmachus]

So, I think it is important to identify the question. The question for me is not whether adoption theology already allowed for gay marriage. That would be absurd, in my view. I don't see how it would be possible for Joseph Smith, who seems not to have had homosexual identity as part of his explicit discourse, to have conceived of gay marriage. That is not the question. The question for me is whether there is something about Mormon theology that excludes the possibility of gay marriage, and I don't see that there is. It is only when one looks to the Brigham Young era for an understanding of Mormonism, instead of Joseph Smith, that one finds a hardening and literalization of the doctrine in a way that would seem to exclude the possibility for good. But Brigham Young's central theological speculation was ultimately rejected in the early 20th century, so I don't see the need to take a Brighamite view of Mormonism as its fixed and unalterable identity.

Nothing is impossible in terms of theology—as I say, Christians managed to come up with a workable, if imperfect model, for a monotheistic god who also has a son who is a god. Joseph Smith said a lot things, bizarre things that are rightly ignores (baby gods?), but the fact that Smith's theology, such as it is, doesn't offer much guidance means only that Utah Mormons have either 1) their own tradition or 2) something external to that tradition as a source for new ideas. Option 2) won't be taken because the authority of the hierarchy rests on a claim to epistemological exclusivity and that they don't need to listen to anyone else and that they are indeed the ultimate arbiters of all truth; and option 1) means that that everything said from Young on has to be dealt with in some way, but even the example of Young that you cite is telling, because it was precisely the speculative and innovative strand that was rejected. Adam-God theory is quite innovative, but Adam-Steve would be even more so. I just don't see practically how this could happen.

But my point, if I didn't put it properly, wasn't limited to theology but to the structures of Mormon experience that arise from the theology and reinforce it in their turn: marriage, priesthood governance, temple rites, and so on that rely on the assumption of heterosexual priesthood authority. I'm not saying it's impossible, but if the reintroduction of an obscure 19th century doctrine plugs one hole of this leaky ship with a square peg, ten more are going to spring up.

Secondly, I would not view Mormon polygamy to be an intensification of the nuclear family, at least not as I see the nuclear family. The traditional nuclear family is defined by its core of two married, heterosexual parents in an (ideally) exclusive relationship. Mormon polygamy was not an intensification of that relationship at all, but a transgression of its boundaries in order to weave different families together for the purpose of salvation as much as procreation. This is not the Western family at all, really. When Joseph Smith approached others with the idea of contracting polygamous marriages, the promise was salvation for the family (as joined to other families in the eternities), not a more intense monogamous, nuclear-family experience.

A fair point, but despite your clarity in this, I have really confused the issue. I am inadequate in my reading of sociology, so I hope that explains why I simply don't have the mental lexicon to explain what I mean here. I don't think that Mormon polygamy was all that more radical in one fundamental respect than Mormon monogamy as it has traditionally been conceived for the Mormon nuclear family: it's not mom + dad + kids and a dog in the backyard wherein there is an equal if relationship between a mother and father but rather Priesthood Dad at the top, beneath him Mom, and beneath her kids. It is in short a hierarchical conception of the family in which a heterosexual male presides over his wife and children, and as I understand it the temple rites are partly a ritual enactment of that familial order (only read about the temple, so I don't know from experience). My point, inadequately expressed I am afraid, was that Mormon polygamy was not that radical from this perspective because it was intensifying the hierarchical imaginary of the Mormon family. This is the conception I heard still preached from the pulpit at conference, and to my knowledge it, like its polygamous extension, has never been renounced as the ideal pattern for family life, even if the Church leaders have made accommodation with the fact that it is not economically and thus socially feasible for many Mormon families—but it's still the ideal.

I am aware of everything you say about the "Kingdom," and I do think that guys like Oaks are fully invested in and fighting for a very literal, viable Kingdom in the now. I just don't think this is a widely held perspective, even in Church leadership. Oaks belongs to a personality cult. Most everyone else in the LDS Church is not aware that they are. That includes the leadership. You can't really sustain a business operation of this type on pristine charisma. This one is sustained by accountants and lawyers. Yeah, there are the guys like Oaks who have nightmares about the assassination of Joseph Smith, and then there are the many people (penetrating the highest levels of leadership) who consider themselves Christian in a milquetoast way. I have heard of numerous interviews for BYU faculty positions in which the Seventy interviewing the candidate said something about having a low-key testimony.

Even the word Kingdom is interpreted in different ways, and the idea that the Kingdom is both present and absent at the same time leaves a lot of room for interpretation.

Yeah, I do get the part about going on the offensive to protect the LDS Church from having to accept gay marriage. And, yes, I think that the LDS Church made its devil's bargain partly for this reason. This is where the culturally conservative accountants and the wild-eyed cult members like Oaks meet in the middle. What we all fight over is the definition of us. A fundamentalist Mormon like Oaks with his celestial wives is fighting for his patriarchal godhood on the righthand of Joseph Smith. Others have a more expansive view of what Mormonism means. You can say that Oaks is right, but this is akin to me to an originalist reading of the Constitution, and I just don't have that much respect for this modernist approach to the past.

Anyhow, I see where you are coming from, and I think you have a strong argument. Still, I think that the soul of an organization is something the people in it fight to define. And, despite the power of men such as Oaks within the LDS Church, I don't believe time is on their side. While I cannot be a part of what is going on in the LDS Church, I try to understand what it is that keeps others going, and I would like to think it is more than misguided progressivism. Hopefully their reasons are more sophisticated and historically grounded than imposing their liberal values on Mormonism. I do think that there are Mormons on both sides of the ideological divide who do exactly this. I think it is also interesting that Mormons entered the culture wars at exactly the time when more Protestant converts were filling their ranks. Many sought a more reliably conservative church and thought they found one in Mormonism. They were only too happy to pick up the fight. But they also had little understanding of what was going on in Oaks' head.

I'm not trying to argue that these Mormons with a more expansive conception of their tradition shouldn't exist; I sympathize with their aims, but I think they are simply deluded and don't put in the work needed to make their expansive vision palatable, let alone persuasive to most Mormons because they 1) draw too much from outside the tradition, 2) over emphasize obscure parts of it, and 3) basically don't approach the Church as it is. Of course a thing can go from being X to Y, but we can still describe X and must if you ever want to get to Y, especially if the thing is largely dominated by a set of people whose primary goal is to maintain it as X.

[_Symmachus]

This entire thread has been wonderful. What a gem! Thank you.

I certainly have to thank Kish for spending the time helping me articulate my position better.

[Guest]

Option 2) won't be taken because the authority of the hierarchy rests on a claim to epistemological exclusivity and that they don't need to listen to anyone else and that they are indeed the ultimate arbiters of all truth; and option 1) means that that everything said from Young on has to be dealt with in some way, but even the example of Young that you cite is telling, because it was precisely the speculative and innovative strand that was rejected. Adam-God theory is quite innovative, but Adam-Steve would be even more so. I just don't see practically how this could happen.

But my point, if I didn't put it properly, wasn't limited to theology but to the structures of Mormon experience that arise from the theology and reinforce it in their turn: marriage, priesthood governance, temple rites, and so on that rely on the assumption of heterosexual priesthood authority. I'm not saying it's impossible, but if the reintroduction of an obscure 19th century doctrine plugs one hole of this leaky ship with a square peg, ten more are going to spring up.

There is so much I could say about this. About Option 2: I would submit that the leadership of the LDS Church has already chosen to import the ideas and agenda of radical Christian extremists who wish to create a Christian Taliban. So much for not importing outside ideas.

Now to Adam and Steve. This is really silly. SILLY. Here Brigham Young and our reading of Brigham Young are at the root of the problem. The endowment was changed to tell us that everything concerning the man in the woman in the drama was to be taken figuratively. Ah, but people continue to double down on literalism. The Adam and Even myth is about the origins of the human race and procreation. It is not good for man to be alone; therefore the means to create a human family is produced.

Brigham also "gifted" us with the legacy of Adam-God, which suggests that his idea of figurative was intended to make room for the most literal kind of anthropo-theology imaginable. But the LDS Church has in a sense already taken care of this problem for us. It unceremoniously dumped Adam-God and insisted, still, that we take the Adam and Even myth figuratively by placing Brigham's words to that effect in the ritual. This opens the door to quite different possibilities.

It is in short a hierarchical conception of the family in which a heterosexual male presides over his wife and children, and as I understand it the temple rites are partly a ritual enactment of that familial order (only read about the temple, so I don't know from experience). My point, inadequately expressed I am afraid, was that Mormon polygamy was not that radical from this perspective because it was intensifying the hierarchical imaginary of the Mormon family. This is the conception I heard still preached from the pulpit at conference, and to my knowledge it, like its polygamous extension, has never been renounced as the ideal pattern for family life, even if the Church leaders have made accommodation with the fact that it is not economically and thus socially feasible for many Mormon families—but it's still the ideal.

I think it is difficult to get around the fact that Mormonism is perhaps the most intensely patriarchal church ever devised. Joseph seems to have had a thing about propping up his dad and in a sense he built up an entire church to deal with that problem. Joseph, Sr. was an unreliable, foolish alcoholic with a lot of kooky ideas. From the Book of Mormon on there seems to be a subtext of redeeming dad and placing him on a pedestal--turning Joseph Sr. into the Patriarch of the new Israel, no less. Yes. This IS a big issue. It is much worse, perhaps, than most feminists realize. At the same time, however, Smith, Jr. did create some levers before he died to even out the playing field between men and women a bit. So far LDS women have been some of the most consistent opponents of their own equality, and I don't know what can be done to overcome that problem.

I'm not trying to argue that these Mormons with a more expansive conception of their tradition shouldn't exist; I sympathize with their aims, but I think they are simply deluded and don't put in the work needed to make their expansive vision palatable, let alone persuasive to most Mormons because they 1) draw too much from outside the tradition, 2) over emphasize obscure parts of it, and 3) basically don't approach the Church as it is. Of course a thing can go from being X to Y, but we can still describe X and must if you ever want to get to Y, especially if the thing is largely dominated by a set of people whose primary goal is to maintain it as X.

I remain fascinated by the easy assumption that it is only the liberals who import outside ideas. Once again I marvel at how genius Augustus was. Call it conservative and old-timey, and you can convince just about anyone that the crap you are pulling is native to the tradition, regardless of what you do. Have Apollo and Diana be the focus of the ludi saeculares? No problem! The ludi saeculares are supposedly as ancient as the hills, but who would remember anyway, since the last time they were performed was long before anyone was born.

So, the liberals really miss the boat by not relentlessly claiming that they are grounding their ideas in the Mormon tradition. I think that is definitely true. You take an apostle who attends/speaks at the meetings of radical extremist Christian groups or Ralph Hancock pretending that Straussian "conservatism" is just good old fashioned Founders' Americanism, and no one seems to question their patently false claims to representing Joseph Smith's theology in an uncomplicated way. Why should anyone actually take that seriously? No one challenges them effectively, least of all liberal Mormons, who are set back on their heels by making the first mistake of identifying with the future instead of the past.

So, yeah, Symmachus. This is all very frustrating. Before you came along and opened my eyes, I had no idea exactly how bad it was. I had an inkling, but your clear thinking and elegant writing make the whole thing a lot more crystal clear and, in a way, much more discouraging. My answers are unrealistic, and I have to say that I lack the time, energy, and the freedom to make much of a contribution. I will step out foolishly and say that I am probably a lot more genuine in my Mormonism than many liberal Mormons are. I guess I could be wrong, but they do do such a bad job of strategizing how to effect change in the LDS Church.

Not that I would do better. Let me be clear on that point. There is a reason that I have made less headway than any of them (reason #1 being that I have not really tried). They deserve their due, as much as people of this ilk have tended to botch things. It goes to show that it is very difficult to get things right, and most of us don't.

I started the Roger Hendrix thread partly because of the serendipity of listening to his interview while we were having this argument. In a way, he is exactly that liberal Mormon you seem to be talking about, but then look at where he was positioned in the LDS Church and how he still views the whole thing. It is interesting that he really liked a lot of things about the LDS Church. It resonated with his personality and values quite well, up to a point. And one can't say he didn't get far. He drew great hope from Official Declaration #2, but then the anti-gay stuff just blew him away. But a lot of the stuff I routinely complain about is just fine and dandy with him. It is guys like Hendrix that make me wonder whether we are all missing the boat, and that unexpected things might yet happen.

[_Gadianton]

I think we might look back one day and realize that Mopologetics itself was a driving force to make gay marriage a reality in the Church. Even without the Mopologists, we had Gordon "I don't know that we teach that" Hinckley. But then, a certain prominent apologist has made some interesting comments over the years that also call into question believes about exaltation that I'd considered fundamental.

I think I mentioned once that when I was around thirteen, my dad took me for a car ride and explained the great mystery that the Father literally impregnated Mary by the usual means. These are cheerful memories now, but back then, while I wouldn't say I was shocked, I was greatly impressed with the seriousness of such teachings that could prove to be a little embarrassing. When this topic came up on Sic et Non recently, the position taken was that we don't know how Jesus was conceived or procreation happens in the eternities -- artificial insemination was used as the defense. Thus, Sic et Non has made it at least possible for a gay couple to procreate in the eternities.

And then one of the SeN staff writers several years ago made a comment on MDDB when the "get your planet" doctrine was brought up, that we don't know in what way we assist in eternal progression. Clearly, his position was that there might not be any spirit children bearing in the next life by those of us who are exalted.

Well, you have to have some sympathy for the apologists who have shouldered embarrassment after embarrassment in defense of the Church, and if they can get out of having to believe in some of these everlasting truths especially when they are sex related, then why shouldn't they? To the extent they offer the membership safety from owning traditional stud-bull Mormonism, spiritualized doctrines of exaltation could be assumed by a large percentage of the membership these days for all I know. I don't really have anyone I can ask about it, unfortunately. But the Mormon doctrines requiring literal heterosexual sex in the eternities have all but been abandoned in the public square by leaders and Mopologists alike, with Mopologists often outright denying them. This isn't a "liberal" thing, but a fundamentalist Victorian conservative thing.

But yes, Symmachus brought up an immense challenge. Intense gender role indoctrination throughout church programming that culminates in the temple rituals doesn't pace the details of whatever the current doctrines of exaltation are or aren't. Even with technology to take the place of human contact in eternity, symbolically, it's really hard to imagine how gay relationships would fit in. But I'd say to gays with families who for whatever reasons I can't comprehend see themselves as Mormon and attend church, by all means, take it for the challenge it is.

Am I wrong that at one time Christians were murdered by Roman emperors in the worst ways and yet, the population of Christians slowly grew in Rome and then one day, though still a minority, Christianity became the official state religion? Perhaps one day the Church of prop 8 will become the vehicle of choice for gay believers to live out their Christian ideals.

[_Kishkumen]

Excellent points, Dean Robbers. Yes, the understanding of gender and procreation could continue to evolve, nay, must evolve, to keep up with the times. Manufacturing humans by splicing together DNA on a Petri dish? No problem, that’s how Elohim’s God Squad did it millennia ago. There is always a way. But the Corporation is like any other such entity. You want to keep your profits up and your customer defections low. You want to find new customers, in fact. So you just can’t go there until the peeps are ready. It’s not so much a question of what is true as it is one of shepherding a brand to a grand future. Roger Hendrix understands this, but he is, at the same time, just a little too ahead of the curve for the Three Stooges (Nelson, Oaks, and Ballard), who understand the prevalence of homophobia among Boomers and even many Gen Xers.

Once Boomers are gone, there will be too few Gen Xers to worry about. (They are the new Silent Generation.) The Church will be forced to embrace gay marriage if it wants to continue to exist as anything more than a curiosity like the odd Swedenborg Chapel or Christian Science Reading Room.