Comments on The Mormon Anomaly: The Grassroots of Modern Revelation

Michah: Thanks for forwarding this post to me. It'...

2009-11-14T20:47:03.595-05:00

Michah: Thanks for forwarding this post to me. It's a good statement on what we began to scratch the surface of a few weeks ago (sorry it took so long for me to respond!). There’s a potential tension that comes up in the church which we don’t discuss much, and that the tension between following the prophet and being open to the pursuit of truth (through personal reflection, questioning, and reasoning). As President Uctdorf talked about in the recent CES fireside, we are a church founded on questions and seeking deeper understanding, but sometimes it seems we shy away from having a healthy amount of doubt/skepticism in the mix (in my opinion).
I'm also excited to read the post about meat and mormons!

I wonder about the Holy Ghost's role in changing f...

2009-07-03T12:53:30.331-04:00

I wonder about the Holy Ghost's role in changing first the members' attitudes and then the church government's. In relation to the blacks receiving the priesthood, it is my opinion that it was what the Lord wanted, and the idea was given to the church members, who then influenced the church leaders, who then turned to God for the answer.

I think if a change is needed, you will often find more and more people coming to that conclusion, and after a time, there will be a change of policy given by revelation. But you have to have the attitudes of the members change first so that such a revelation will not be met with overwhelming opposition.

(I believe there have been examples of such opposition silencing church leaders, as in President Kimball's stance on hunting. I don't have any references, so I can't be 100% sure what the result was, only that I have heard many people mentioning that there was an opposition and that Kimball never talked about it after that point.)

I think Micah has a good point about how we have c...

2008-10-15T18:36:00.000-04:00

I think Micah has a good point about how we have created heroic tales of those pleading for change in our discourse. I personally think that those pleas did in fact have an effect in pushing for the priesthood to be extended to all blacks, if for no other reason than they were the voice of a changing church and world society.

I think a much larger question that this discussion brings up is, "what are we to expect from our leaders?" As representatives of God, do we share in their decision making process and thus in their mistaken decisions? Can we accept that denying blacks the priesthood in the first place was a mistake, as seems to be implied by the FAIR article that Micah linked to?

I know that what is popularly taught in the gospel is, "you can receive revelation for you, but not for the church." This makes sense, but can we plead for revelation and can we voice our discontent when received revelation goes against everything our conscience and hearts are telling us without incurring condemnation or excommunication?

I'm not sure these answers are in any church manual, which is why I find this forum so valuable.

Anonymous: I agree that there's some question as ...

2008-10-14T09:55:00.000-04:00

Anonymous: I agree that there's some question as to the strength of the push against the status quo at the time (numbers and outspokenness). But, regardless, we've created heroic tales in the discourse that make the behavior of members who allegedly supported blacks receiving the priesthood acceptable. Thus, whether protest behavior actually happened could be considered moot for the purpose of discussion.

At the same time, your point really strikes at the core of my thought process. We might be able to look back and say that those who believed blacks should receive the priesthood were effective in their purposes. But that's easy to say because history has proven that they were right. In an ex ante analysis of any given matter of controversy, it is much more difficult to judge what will be deemed acceptable forms of protest. I wonder what factors would be key to an evaluation... perhaps the historical nature of the issue, closeness to core church doctrine, reception by church leaders, reception by church members...

Micah - thanks so much for this post. You raise m...

2008-10-13T19:03:00.000-04:00

Micah - thanks so much for this post. You raise more than one issue here, and all deserve careful thought and lengthy commentary. I have to say that I am skeptical of whether the prevailing attitude in the late 70's was really one where members were openly pushing for blacks to get the priesthood. I don't mean to sound cynical when I say that an attitude like the one you describe seems so far removed from what I see in church today that I have difficulty imaging that it could have been commonplace just thirty years ago. Also, this strikes me as one of those issues that has the potential to surreptitiously become "mainstream" only ex post facto. In short, I find myself suspecting that that contemporary attidues about controversial topics in the church are very much the same as they ever were. I hope that you are right and I am wrong, and that we can find a way to go back to the progressive dialogue we once knew.