There’s nothing like a good racial kerfuffle in Mormondom to set the bloggernacle abubble (This is a link to the chronology of what I’ll call Bott-gate).
Here’s a summary. A professor at BYU repeats in public what Mormons, up until about 30 years ago, only said in private, and now, as a friend on Facebook put it, the guy “has tire marks on his earnest soul” from being thrown under a few different busses by a church he’s spent his life serving.” It’s not a happy affair, really. After a few phone calls from Salt Lake, the poor chap was responding to press inquiries by emailing out this statement: “I have been asked by the Church to forward their response and endorse it. In order to be obedient, that will be the extent of my comment.” Nothing like a grown man telling other adults that he’s “being obedient” to put things into perspective.
A few other bloggers have gone first on this. Jana Riess and Joanna Brooks, in particular, both deserve a read. I just want to make a few points to any fellow Mormons out there that may be paying attention:
1) The “we don’t know why we did it” defense of our racist past (i.e. our ban on blacks receiving the priesthood) is popular these days. If you find yourself tempted to follow the crowd down this path, don’t do it. This is not a good defense. We end up looking like hapless teenagers caught smoking pot behind the school telling their parents that they “don’t know why they did it.”
2) A variation on this argument is the all-time classic “God told us to do it” defense. What’s curious about this particular defense in our case is that we don’t have any record of God telling us anything about it, really. There is no official pronouncement. No revelation. It’s unclear what Joseph Smith taught on the subject. All we have is an accumulation of racist precedent, and then a hundred years or so of reluctance to challenge that precedent, until the church wound up with its head in a vice and then proclaimed in 1978 that, to quote The Book of Mormon musical (around 3:10 in), “God changed his mind about black people.”
3) As Mormons we want everyone to like us. We care how we are perceived. We can’t hide the priesthood ban, so we have to own it–but we’re still tempted to try to bury the motivation for it. It’s a “Look Mom, No Hands!” approach to issue management . We want to say, “look, we aren’t racists, and we have no idea why that racist policy was enforced for 130 years.” But here’s the problem. Our motivation for the ban (i.e. the logic behind it, the narrative that supported and sustained it), and the ban itself, are conjoined twins. They can’t be separated. God didn’t just drop the priesthood ban, fully formed, into the laps of church officials and then wish them luck. We have evidence of the process–of the sausage making, if you will. Church leaders debated the rationale (curse of Cain? less valiant in the pre-existence?) as they formulated the policy (could blacks receive the temple endowment? or the priesthood?). As time went on, the rationale for the ban helped to cement and perpetuate the ban itself. And the ban helped to cement and perpetuate the rationale for it.
4) So if the rationale behind the priesthood ban was “speculation and opinion, not doctrine” then what about the ban itself? Are we claiming that the ban was “correct” and that it was just the ugly rationale that we attached to it that’s the problem? I’m not sure if I have to choose between the “chicken” of the priesthood ban and the “egg” of the rationale for it, that I want the chicken.
Here’s a radical idea. I suggest we employ this clever, three-step approach: 1) We have the integrity to see things as they really are, not as we want them to be (or as we think they should be), 2) We talk openly and honestly about our church and its history (there is a lot to be proud of), and 3) We humbly recognize that we see through a glass darkly, just like everyone else (and there is nothing wrong with admitting we were wrong).
Admitting that we were wrong about both the chicken and the egg. All of it.
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The 3 step approach works alright as long as one disavows the whole “we are the one true and restored church” claim. Otherwise, saying it was all a mistake, the church was wrong, is like saying God was wrong. God is supposed to be leading the church. That’s the whole point of having a living prophet, right? To make sure that we always know what God wants, so we don’t have to guess or be lead astray by the flawed opinions of mortals. So was God asleep at the wheel on this one? Apathetic? Too busy/distracted having fun with his many wives or engineering some new creature to pay attention to what was going on for those 130 years? It’s not like this is some minor issue, like how many earrings women should have. It’s a very serious thing to deny blessings required for exaltation to an entire race of people. If you can’t trust the church to get it right on something like that, if they can make a mistake on something like that, then they can make a mistake about anything. Why trust them at all? Because if God didn’t care enough to set them straight right away about this whole denying blacks the priesthood and temple blessings thing, then what makes you think he’s going to care enough to make sure the church gets it right about things that are much less important?
@Random Enigma, I understand the logic behind your reasoning, but I’m not sure I agree with it (entirely). I think absolute trust is misplaced, but so is the opposite. What’s wrong with viewing the church as a well-meaning institution that does its best (despite its idiosyncrasies, flaws, mistakes, and blindspots)? I agree that the doctrine (and the norms) are hostile to this kind of “halfway” approach–and it does require a surrender of the “one true church” crutch–but I think its the most defensible.
I like this question: “Why trust them at all? Because if God didn’t care enough to set them straight right away about this whole denying blacks the priesthood and temple blessings thing, then what makes you think he’s going to care enough to make sure the church gets it right about things that are much less important?”
I think the answer that question is this: “He’s not. For those of us that believe in God, it’s up to us to do the best we can to get it right. The church can help us, in certain respects, to do that, but we need to remember that we are responsible for our own beliefs, and our own actions. We can’t just outsource our spirituality to the church.”
Great article, Brent!
Brent,
I agree with Tauna — great blog post. My interpretation of Random Enigma’s comment is that if we don’t let go of the “one true and living church” rhetoric, we will find ourselves in a logical bind. We’re the one true and living church, but our ordained apostles and prophets got it wrong for 130 years on a very important issue. In your response, I think you agree with R.E. — letting go of the absolute truth claim would allow us to move forward after repudiating previous leaders’ pronouncements.
I fear this is too much of a conundrum, however, for the institution. Letting go of the “one true church” claim would be a fundamentally wrenching experience for the institution and for most of its members. So I predict that what will actually happen is that the church will find a tantalizingly vague way to sort of repudiate the past, it’s most stalwart members will be satisfied that the policy change in 1978 “speaks for itself” and more members who prefer a little logic and ethics with their faith commitment will get even looser in the saddle. What is a little harder to predict is what impact a sustained discussion of this during the course of the presidential campaign will have on the institution and its membership.
In the end, I think it is a failing in the leaders of the Church. It is the satisfaction with their own prejudice that allowed these men to spend time justifying their position. If we had been more valiant, and knocked down their rationales one by one, we may have been able to “faithfully agitate” for change. Until these men feel the need to bring a question to the Lord, it is hard to imagine the Lord foisting upon them a radical change.
I have been working on this subject since 1974. (My grandfather was so enraged by it, it caused a 40 year inactivity since the mid 50s.) For me, it was all I could talk about with any church leader I came in contact with during the 4 years leading up to ’78. All excuses for the priesthood ban come out sounding like confabulation. If you look carefully, you can see parallels with the present ‘war on the gays.’ In these confabulations, you usually see a lot of ‘if, then’ arguments. Most of them irrational. (If ERA passes, then public restrooms will become unisex– not only did that seem an unlikely outcome, no one had addressed the fact that a long history unisex bathrooms in Europe and parts of Asia were no big deal.)(If gay marriage passes, it will destroy marriage.– as if marriage wasn’t in a cataclysmic decline since the 70s… what insurance adjusters like to call a ‘pre-existing condition.’)
In dealing with the ban on the priesthood, there are a few things that put it all in perspective.
The curse of Cain could not have happened. If “We believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam’s transgressions.” Then we cannot by any stretch of the imagination believe anyone could be punished for Cain’s transgression.
Some were less valiant in the pre-earth life. There is no scriptural basis for this. The trial by which we are to prove ourselves wasn’t to start until we come to the earth. For the idea to be true, there would have to have been a judgement before this life to determine who had been more or less valiant. There is no evidence for any of this.
The church and homosexuality has already begun to run along similar lines, and will need sometime in the future to fumble for an answer to the uninspired position they hold now.
Are homosexuals human? Yes. Is marriage a human right? Yes. Can you deny homosexuals the right to marry without impinging on their humanity?
Blacks are not ready to hold the priesthood. I’m not really interested in dealing with this blatantly racist garbage, except to note that there are similar ways this argument has been used in various ways. The thinking was that if you give the blacks the priesthood, they will be held to a higher standard than they are able to keep. It is equally silly to say that women haven’t been given the priesthood because they are so righteous, they don’t need it. Homosexuals shouldn’t marry because they are incapable of monogamy. (Which begs the question, ‘In denying someone marriage, aren’t you affecting the probability of monogamy?’) All of these assertions are absurd in that they are broad generalizations that prove to have little basis in demonstrable fact.
If, as the Church continues to tell us, Heavenly Father loves each of us as individuals, why would he judge us as demographics?
In an interview with David Ransom, Pres. HInckley was asked, “At present women are not allowed to be priests in your Church… Is it possible that the rules could change in the future…?” To which Pres. Hinckley replied, “He could change them yes… But there is no agitation for that. We don’t find it.”
We, as individual tithe paying church members need to be emboldened by our position, and this remarkable invitation from Pres. Hinckley to faithfully agitate for change. Until then, it may be unrealistic to expect the General Authorities to seek diligently of the Lord.
“For none of these iniquities come of the Lord; for he doeth that which is good among the children of men; and he doeth nothing save it be plain unto the children of men; and he inviteth them all to come unto him and partake of his goodness; and he denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; and he remembereth the heathen; and all are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile.” -2Nephi 26:33
Wow. I don’t even have words to express how much I appreciate your comment, @Bitherwack. I think I agree with pretty much every point you put forward. Just want to say thanks!
@Bitherwack, I really like this: “‘At present women are not allowed to be priests in your Church. . . Is it possible that the rules could change in the future. . .?’ To which Pres. Hinckley replied, “He could change them yes. . . But there is no agitation for that. We don’t find it.” We, as individual tithe paying church members need to be emboldened by our position, and this remarkable invitation from Pres. Hinckley to faithfully agitate for change.” I think viewing this statement as an invitation to agitate for change is great. Thanks for the thoughtful comment.
Much of this discussion seems to want to completely toss out the concept of revelation; the single most fundamental point of the religion. The assumption is that if racism were “wrong” then God would have necessarily smacked the leadership upside their collective heads and told them to admit black people; but this is not necessarily the case. Suppose a clear revelation had come in 1850 that allowed blacks into full priesthood, temple, etc… There is a good argument to be made, given the horrendous race politics of that era, that it would have destroyed the church; possibly adding “Bleeding Utah” to “Bleeding Kansas” in the history books. It’s possible that the change wasn’t made because the church membership and leaderships weren’t ready for it and couldn’t have handled it. God apparently does work, to a degree, within the confines of the society in order to further His work; else why would the law of Moses have allowed slaves, or not elevated women to a more enlightened position in their society? Why did it take so long for the apostle Peter to accept mingling with Gentiles? To stretch the similarity, the enlightened founders of the US allowed slavery in the constitution, else there wouldn’t have been a constitution. This mode of thought also doesn’t take the faithless approach of eliminating inspiration or revelation (or the withholding of such) in considering what and why it happened.
Incidentally, my father joined the church in the 50’s *despite* the policy on the blacks; it was a serious issue for him, but he recognized truth and held out hope for change. He shed tears of joy in 1978. I’m not sure my grandparents ever got past their own racism. That generational shift was significant and, to my mind, explanatory.
That would make the apology something along the lines of: “We’re sorry for the racial discrimination of the past. It would appear that we weren’t ready for it and until we had leadership and membership who truly, honestly felt that they could move beyond society’s racist past (well, “present” in some regions) and embrace fully their brothers and sisters of all races.”
oh yeah, can’t believe I left out the other elephant in the room: polygamy repealed because it likely would have destroyed the church. Another instance of social policy affecting church policy in order to continue moving forward.
pfft, and maybe the hypothetical apology would actually form a complete, grammatically correct sentence. sorry for the poor self-editing.
Ok- Can’t believe I am about to do this, but have to defend Bott. Wow. Have to defend him.
I know what he said was reprehensible. I totally disagree with it and I don’t have a tin ear. But wow, was he thrown under the bus. What he said is nothing that hasn’t been said around the picnic tables of my family reunions. In fact, what he said was a kinder version of it. And he has been thrown under the bus for it, much like Brent pointed out. BUT- what was he to say? Other than say- the church was completely and utterly wrong and was not led by God in the case of blacks and the Priesthood, what was he to say? The church leaves us all wide open by not coming forward with a real explanation. All that is left is our suppositions, our musings and the musings of former authorities and family members. He didn’t do anything that any mormon family hasn’t witnessed around their own dinner tables. We have tried and tried to make sense of a church that would preach love of all mankind that pursued a racist and hateful policy/doctrine/practice/ whatever you wanna call it for over 100 years.
The ban is shameful and sinful. It should never have been. And if righteous voices had prevailed, it would have ended so much sooner. But they didn’t. And now, to cover up all the confusion, obfuscation, explanation, supposition, and varied ridiculous cognitive hoop jumping, they throw their own under the bus. Sad. so sad. I have to say, I actually love mormons, and the gospel, but this is the kind of thing where you can see the rift between people, doctrine, practice, and administration.
Just come out with the truth already. Brigham Young- my 4th great-grandfather- a renowned organizer, moses, polygamist, and leader was ridiculously racist. And that led to a ban that has no place in revelation, or gospel truths. It was purely out of ignorance, political expediency, and hatred.
Well, Brigham should know- His great-great-great-great grandchildren are black. That is right- my first cousins- 4th great grandchildren of Brigham are black. So- that is a meeting I hope to witness in the next life!
Meanwhile, the church should have the guts to step forward and say- WE HAVE LEFT OUR MEMBERS OPEN TO THIS KIND OF RIDICULOUS RACIST SPECULATION FOR A CENTURY, AND THE TRUTH IS IT WAS RACIST AND WRONG. WE ARE SORRY. IT IS GONE. WE DON”T WANT OUR MEMBERSHIP TO CONTINUE TO TRY TO MAKE SENSE OF THE SENSELESS. WE TAKE THE RESPONSIBILITY OF DENYING THE BLESSINGS TO GENERATIONS OF PEOPLE AND FOR ENCOURAGING RACIST ATTITUDE AMONGST OUR FAITHFUL. WE REPENT AND PROMISE TO TRY TO DO BETTER.
@Reynold, two quick problems with the “we weren’t ready for it” line of reasoning: 1) The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was in. . . 1964 (you would expect that the church would at least be on par with other segments of society, not more than a decade behind), 2) If the membership of the church “wasn’t ready” for it, then why wasn’t the leadership of the church busy preparing the members so that they would be ready for it (instead of digging in their heels and actually encouraging members to resist positive societal change)?
@Rachel, great comment. Yes, he really was thrown under the bus. Very sad.
I think the lesson to be learned here is that unless your job is official church spokesperson, you probably shouldn’t give interviews or speak publicly about what the church teaches now or has taught in the past.
I don’t know, this seems to be more like a good test case. We now know what the church is willing to deny about our church past. Maybe we should speak up more so that we can actually measure what church headquarters is willing to own or reject. I would also like to read the whole transcript and context in which Bott made his comments. I could be inclined to believe that he was trying to give an accurate history lesson.
Hinged, it would be good to see the transcript, but from my own memory when he was my bishop at BYU, reports from some of his former students and his own Know Your Religion blog posts (since taken down, but widely circulated before, I read several of them myself), the reporter gave an accurate account of Bott’s theories (he was always clear that they were his ideas — but it’s tricky when he’s giving them as a professor, bishop or mission president).
I think part of the problem is that the reporter sought Bott out as a religious scholar without understanding how different the BYU religion department is from the religious departments of other universities. Or, perhaps Horowitz had seen Bott’s blog and knew exactly how different the department is. Either way, and despite Bott’s protestations, he has been spreading these ideas unchecked for years and years.
My response has been that this was clearly a racist policy. I, too, wish our public relations department focused less on spin. I’m so troubled by the double speak I hear from them. I recently sent them an email saying (basically) “you know how you put out that we believe in marriage between one man and one woman? That’s not totally accurate or honest.” I haven’t heard back. But I did mention it to a few of my active Mormon friends. The thought was that of course we believe men will have more than one wife in eternity and maybe we shouldn’t try to explain it because it would be throwing pearls before swine. It’s a slippery slope. I told them in the email that I personally thought that belief (one man, many woman) was hogwash and comparable to Islam’s 10000 virgins fantasy. I haven’t heard back.