posted
The document approved by the American Bishops agrees to not consecrate any more gay Bishops, but calls for Rev. Robinson to be included in the Lambeth Conference (worldwide gathering of Bishops) in 2008 (so far he has not been invited). It's a compromise position -- it remains to be seen whether the more conservative Anglican churches in Africa and Latin America with accept it or whether they will still threaten to boycott the conference if Rev. Robinson is invited. The document also states that the Episcopal church will not approve an official rite for the blessing of same sex marriage. That does not ban individual parishes/priests from developing their own liturgies, as many are already doing.
*** disclaimer -- I haven't read the document yet, this is from a description of it on NPR.
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posted
That summary covers the American, African, and Latin American Anglican churches (thats a lot of As). Out of curiosity, how does the original church in England stand on the matter?
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posted
The Archbishop of Cantebury is trying to mediate the whole thing. He was present at the meeting with the American bishops who drafted the statement.**
**Which I have now read, and I stand by my earlier summary.
posted
Maybe I'm not looking at this right, but this looks to me a lot like delaying the inevitible. I don't see a way (absent the, to me, very unlikely shift of the conservative elements away from anti-gay stances) for this issue to ultimately be reconciled between the factions.
I have to wonder if, in the long run, it might be better or more unifying for the Anglicans to have this split and then work towards a rapprochement between the split groups rather than trying to maintain full unity between groups with fundamentally different stances on what they seem to be defining as very important issues.
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posted
The Boston Globe article takes the opposite view from the New York Times.
Kat, in a way they’re both right. The more conservative bishops worldwide want the Episcopal Church USA to change their policies about the position of gay and lesbian people in the life of the church. The Episcopal bishops refused, but agreed "to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion." So the official policy still allows for gay or lesbian bishops, but they’ve agreed to not elect any for now.
They also included a statement calling for an end to bishops from other dioceses affiliating themselves with dissenting churches in the US – some conservative congregations have declared that they are now under the oversight of the Bishop of Nigeria or Kenya rather than the bishop of the diocese that they’re located in.
posted
I guess "American Anglicans' Counteroffer Contains Both Concessions and Demands" is too long for a headline.
Or: "Anglican Doctrine Unchnaged but Praxis Goes Practical"
<sidenote> Hmm...that last one reminds me of the Official Declaration 1 that ended polygamy for the LDS.
Wilford Woodruff: "I now publicly declare that my advice to the Latter-day Saints is to refrain from contracting any marriage forbidden by the law of the land."
That's the biggest statement. Matt wondered to me last weekend what that would mean if polygamy ever became legal again (which is not out of the question, all things considered). </sidenote>
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posted
But if there was some way to get "both" before "counteroffer" (and still have it make sense) it would be alphabetically pleasing.
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quote: Matt wondered to me last weekend what that would mean if polygamy ever became legal again (which is not out of the question, all things considered).
I understand that polygamy is legal in some African countries with a Mormon population. I don't know how that is handled.
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posted
Enough has been said by modern prophets against the practice that I think most localities assume it should be handled as Jacob directs in the Book of Mormon-- that, absent a specific divine command, it is not to be practiced.
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quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: I'd assume the same thing, but I don't really know how that's been handled.
For example, what do they do if somebody living polygamy wants to be baptized?
I don't know.
I never even considered that. I need to think about that one. It's makes for some very interesting thinking.
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posted
I've thought about it a lot. Though Muslims converting hasn't been a big issue thus far. I'd be surprised if there haven't been cases in Africa, though.
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posted
I'd really like to know if the church would allow a polygamist who converts to be sealed to all his wives or if some sort of middle arrangement is made. I really want to look that up.
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posted
Currently African polygamists are not allowed baptism unless they divorce all the wives beyond one.
This strikes me as odd, given that there's never been theological renunciation of polygamy; all we've got is Official Declaration 1, which is vaguely worded enough that a goodly number of the Quorum of the Twelve believed it was either 1)a public relations move not intended to be taken seriously or 2)A temporary contingency that would be dropped once Utah won its statehood. It's not worded like a revelation; it's a letter from Wilford Woodruff addressed "To Whom It May Concern." And it clearly indicates that US federal law is the motivating force behind his actions.
Several months later, Woodruff described the visions associated with it, and they are entirely pragmatic; they're not about polygamy, per se - they're about what the US government would do if polygamy continued to be practiced. OD1, in short, depicts plural marriage as a worthwhile thing abandoned under duress.
Against this we've got sections 131 and 132, which are still there, and which clearly indicate the salvific and divinely ordained nature of plural marriage. And we've got continued solemnization of polygamous sealings in temples.
It's no wonder to me that a lot of Mormons still believe that polygamy is the order of marriage in heaven; we don't really have a clear narrative of it, or a consistent or coherent policy; we just don't talk about it. But it's still sitting there in the center of Mormon theology. Heck, I'm surprised the fundamentalist movement isn't larger.
If it were legalized in the United States, my guess is that the General Authorities would start retconning officially, as opposed to the vague unofficial retconning that goes on now.
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quote:Currently African polygamists are not allowed baptism unless they divorce all the wives beyond one.
Not that I think you are lying, but where did you find this out?
quote:This strikes me as odd, given that there's never been theological renunciation of polygamy
If the God through his prophet says "No polygamy right now," then that's God saying it's not for us to participate in that ordinance. You don't have to pass a moral judgement on the practice, it will come back if it comes back.
We had the law of consecration previously and God revoked that until such a time as He feels we are ready to try it again. Why is that any different then polygamy? Both laws could be argued to be the rule of heaven and yet we do not live under them now whereas formally we did.
sections 131 and 132 don't seem to me to be in opposition to OD1 they were what the Lord wanted that group of people to do at that time. Right now he has a different set of guidelines that we should fully expect to change for generations down the road.
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posted
Oh, jeepers, it's been floating around in my head for a long time. Here's a Salt Lake Tribune article. How's that?
quote: If the God through his prophet says "No polygamy right now,"
Fair enough. I don't think this has happened. Neither did Woodruff; Thomas Alexander's biography makes clear that Woodruff believed and insisted that OD-1 was not a revelation; it was him as leader acting for the welfare of the church.
quote: sections 131 and 132 don't seem to me to be in opposition to OD1 they were what the Lord wanted that group of people to do at that time.
Not sure this is a tenable argument; we still teach these sections in Sunday School, for example; and we still use them extensively to justify temple sealings. They're certainly much more surely revelation than OD-1 is. 131's pretty explicit as it describes how heaven works.
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posted
When I saw this discussion I emailed a friend of mine who is currently an LDS mission president in Africa. In brief, he said that people living in polygamous relationships are not taught by the missionaries, and if they are taught by mistake, once it is discovered they are not baptized. (I assume that's part of the baptismal interview, although he didn't say so) He said that anyone who has ever lived in a polygamous relationship must have Area Presidency approval before they can be baptized, and he doesn't have authority as a m.p. to authorize their baptism.
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posted
Uprooted: Thanks for the info, that's a very interesting policy for African investigators.
MattB:
quote:This strikes me as odd, given that there's never been theological renunciation of polygamy; all we've got is Official Declaration 1, which is vaguely worded enough that a goodly number of the Quorum of the Twelve believed it was either 1)a public relations move not intended to be taken seriously or 2)A temporary contingency that would be dropped once Utah won its statehood. It's not worded like a revelation; it's a letter from Wilford Woodruff addressed "To Whom It May Concern." And it clearly indicates that US federal law is the motivating force behind his actions.
I'm not sure why you think you know the minds of all those members of the quorum of the twelve, I'd love to know where you learned that, thanks for the SLT article link BTW.
Also though I am sure you believe it was politics that prompted the theological change, I personally truly believe it was what God commanded and therefore it is what Wilford Woodruff did. I don't think OD1 is vague at all in fact it's quite explicit. Lorenzo Snows motion to recognize President Woodruff as the only man on earth with the keys to permit or forbid plural sealings and to put the manifesto to a sustaining vote in general conference to me removes any doubt on the matter being closed from that time onward.
Thomas Alexanders statement (by you) that president woodruff insisted that OD1 was not a revelation is a bit perplexing. President Woodruff certainly said the following in his talk about the Manifesto,
quote:"I saw exactly what would come to pass if there was not something done. I have had this spirit upon me for a long time. But I want to say this: I should have let all the temples go out of our hands; I should have gone to prison myself, and let every other man go there, had not the God of heaven commanded me to do what I did do; and when the hour came that I was commanded to do that, it was all clear to me. I went before the Lord, and I wrote what the Lord told me to write"
The only think I can think of that would cause me to agree with Alexander is that OD1 is not worded as a "Thus saith the Lord to the church" type revelation. It's in the form of "I as prophet of the church stopping plural marriage and using my influence as prophet to persuade every member of the church to follow suit."
In that sense I can see it as not being a typical revelation, but if the prophet says, "I'm doing this and I think you should too," for Mormons that is VERY close to him saying, "God wants you to do it." As the head of the church, if we are to believe another quote by Wilford Woodruff, he would never lead the church astray as God would never select such a man to be prophet in the first place.
quote:Not sure this is a tenable argument; we still teach these sections in Sunday School, for example; and we still use them extensively to justify temple sealings. They're certainly much more surely revelation than OD-1 is. 131's pretty explicit as it describes how heaven works.
That's like saying god cannot both reveal and fulfill the Law of Moses. I don't think any leader of the church has said that Joseph Smith was mistaken in revealing polygamy or that any man who practiced it was wrong to do so. We simply agree that as Joseph Smith was inspired to institute the practice for the saints at the time, Wilford Woodruff was inspired to stop the practice. Whether this is a temporary state or a permanent one is something we can only speculate.
My personal opinion is that plural marriage certainly exists in heaven, that people will practice it, and that it works because of the perfect love that exists amongst people there. It may very well be permitted again here on earth within the church at a later date, but of that I am not certain.
I do believe that if it does return that that coupled with the law of consecration returning will cause many people to fall away from the faith.
But that is all my opinion, I am equally certain my beliefs on this matter can easily change.
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We know what members of the Quorum thought from their papers, from minutes of meetings, letters, etc. We have, for example, Abraham Cannon's diary; he had talked to Woodruff beforehand and knew Woodruff was very worried. Thus, the manifesto was not a shock to him. However, John W. Taylor (the church president's son) and John Henry Smith (later in Joseph F. Smith's first presidency), both vigorously opposed the Manifesto. Taylor and Matthias Cowley (whose nephew Matthew Cowley was an apostle in the fifties) believed that the Manifesto was merely a political strategy to get the government of the church's back; there's evidence that this was an opinion widely shared. They (and Lorenzo Snow, incidentally) performed plural marriages in secret well into the twentieth century. Indeed, the diary of John Nuttall, Woodruff's secretary, indicates that Woodruff himself married a plural wife in 1897.
Now, all of this makes me skeptical as to whether folks at the time actually believed that the Manifesto was a revelation. Woodruff's own diary says it came about in this way: In the summer of 1890, the Supreme Court had rejected the Church's last appeal to overturn the Edmunds-Tucker Act, which made polygamy a felony. This, according to the diary, is why Woodruff began thinking that perhaps, as he says, "for the temporal welfare of the church" polygamy might have to be abandoned. According to the diary, he prayed about it, and then became convinced that he would have to persuade the rest of the church that a Manifesto would have to be issued. The wording he uses is: "After praying to the Lord and feeling inspired by his spirit I have issued the following Proclamation." He then declared his intention to submit to the laws of the land "and to use my influence with the members of the Church over which I preside to have them do likewise." Now - this is interesting, and it is certainly possible to interpret this as God deciding to end polygamy. However, I (and most historians I've read) based on the plain fact that the leadership of the Church did not give up polygamy in 1890, and the fact that polygamy continues in a metaphysical way today, interpret it to indicate that the Manifesto was a pragmatic political move, based on political pressures, and it was not intended to end polygamy for good and all; rather, it was intended to ensure that the Church was not crushed.
In local speeches Woodruff gave, recorded in newspapers and diaries, indicate that he stressed this theme for several years after the Manifesto. He consistently describes the Manifesto as a tactic, a strategy to save the Church from bankruptcy and oppression. He also indicates that he believed polygamy would return when the federal government took its foot off the church's throat. In 1905, Joseph F. Smith finally declared that polygamy would be an excommunicatable offense - at the same time that Reed Smoot, an apostle elected to the Senate, was coming under a great deal of scrutiny from the Senate. At that point, Apostles Cowley and Taylor were excommunicated. It probably took another five years or so to completely root out GAs who were still performing such marriages.
However, Smith's second Manifesto still did not offer any theological or doctrinal reversal of plural marriage, which is what causes confusion still today, I think.
You're not alone, by the way: Bruce R. McConkie taught that Christ would restore polygamy at the Second Coming.
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posted
You make some interesting points Matt, and appears your knowledge on this particular subject is greater then mine in some respects.
Is it impossible that the manifesto WAS intended by God as a temporary stop to plural marriage and it took the church time to realize it as such?
Joseph Smith had the revelation for plural marriages many months before he actually announced it. According to him he was compelled to reveal it by God under pain of being removed from his place. Spencer W. Kimball knew it was the will of the lord that Black members be offered the priesthood but felt it important to assemble the quorum of the twelve, debate the issue and then pray jointly as the first presidency + QOT12 and have them all arrive at the same consensus through revelation. Bruce R. McConkie was a known opponent of the revelation until the prayer.
My point being that not all revelations are fully understood, when they are revealed nor implemented immediately. Jesus revealed that he was going to die and be resurrected from almost the very beginning of his ministry and yet nobody really got it until after the fact.
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