Thursday, November 27, 2003
New Location
Times and Seasons is now located at www.timesandseasons.org. You can click on the link, or wait to be redirected there shortly . . .
Wednesday, November 26, 2003
The Conservative Case for Group and Sibling Marriage
I one-up David Brooks' attempt to spread the Power of Marriage at The Buck Stops Here.
He Forgets Not His Own
We Gather Together (Prayer of Thanksgiving)
We gather together to ask the Lord's blessing;
He chastens and hastens His will to make known;
The wicked oppressing now cease from distressing.
Sing praises to His name; He forgets not His own.
Beside us to guide us, our God with us joining,
Ordaining, maintaining His kingdom divine;
So from the beginning the fight we are winning;
Thou, Lord, wast at our side; all glory be Thine!
We all do extol Thee, Thou Leader triumphant,
And pray that Thou still our Defender wilt be.
Let they congregation escape tribulation;
Thy name be ever praised! O Lord, make us free!
(Text anonymous, 17th-century Dutch; trans. by Theodore Baker, 1851-1934)
Happy Thanksgiving everyone! May your day be filled with friends and family, gratitude, good food, and good cheer.
Nephites, Lamanites, and Native Americans
I admit it -- I started this whole mess, in part because I was quite surprised by some of the Historian's comments. (This post will include some text which is in the comments section of Nate's earlier post, for purposes of putting my discussion in one place).
The Historian wrote about:
"a supposed Mormon belief that Native Americans were descended from Israelite origin. . . . Informed Mormons have shown for over sixty years on the basis of the Book of Mormon text itself that it does not teach that Native Americans are descended from Israelite origin (Mormon scholars argue that the Book of Mormon story took place a limited geographical space and that the DNA of one family could not have had any measurable impact on the DNA of an entire native population)."
As I mentioned in Nate's comments, I like to consider myself an "informed" Mormon, and I have always been under the impression that church members believe most Native Americans are descended from Lehites.
Nate's follow-up cites to Terryl Givens and Noel Reynolds. Fair enough -- there is some support among scholars for the non-Lehite descent theory. However, it's going to take a lot more than that to convince me either (a) that the authoritative evidence leads to that conclusion and rules out the idea of general Lehite ancestry of Native Americans, or (b) that the belief of general Lehite ancestry can accurately be characterized as a "supposed belief" of church members which is rejected by "informed" members.
As to (a), it seems to me that the evidence can be laid out as follows:
In support of non-Lehite descent:
1. Various FARMS articles
2. The possibility that this interpretation is necessary to make the Book of Mormon feasible.
In support of Lehite descent:
1. Numerous statements by general authorities,* including
a. many recent statements,
b. many rather detailed statements, and
c. many statements by early church leaders.
2. Lack of discussion of any other people in Book of Mormon.
3. Some statements within the Book of Mormon which most naturally imply Lehite descent (i.e. 1st Nephi 12-13) (I know, I'm being "superficial" -- otherwise known as the most natural reading of the text).
4. My perception that there is a widespread belief among church members of general Lehite descent; combined with a failure on the part of the church leaders (the ones who receive revelation) to correct this belief, which one might assume they would do if it were wrong.
5. As Dave points out in a comment, the Book of Mormon introduction also supports this view.
I will look into this issue more, however I remain dubious of the validity of proposition (a) (general non-Lehite descent).
As for proposition (b) (that such belief should be considered a "supposed" church belief not held by "informed" members), my own observation is that this belief is widely shared among church members and is endorsed by church leaders at every level. Dave's conclusion is, I think, probably correct; he suggests that:
When The Historian holds out theories of "Mormon scholars" (i.e., FARMS) as representing anything like actual Mormon beliefs or statements on the origin of Native Americans, I think he is being disingenuous.
I would, in fact, go further than Dave -- I think that disingenuous is the most charitable reading of the Historian's proposition, but it could also be fairly characterized as intellectually dishonest. For better or worse, church leaders have gone on the record in support of general Lehite descent. Why not dance with the one who brought us?
(Isn't it a bit ironic that the resident "liberal Mormon" is suddenly defending the more orthodox view here?)
(I apologize if this post is a little combative in tone -- but hey, nobody likes to be called "uninformed").
------
* Footnote:
Below are two general authority references, as well as the Book of Mormon introduction:
Elder Ted E. Brewerton states:
"Many migratory groups came to the Americas, but none was as important as the three mentioned in the Book of Mormon. The blood of these people flows in the veins of the Blackfoot and the Blood Indians of Alberta, Canada; in the Navajo and the Apache of the American Southwest; the Inca of western South America; the Aztec of Mexico; the Maya of Guatemala; and in other native American groups in the Western Hemisphere and the Pacific islands." (This is from the Ensign of Nov. 1995; his article contains numerous other references to Lehite descent.)
Joseph Smith's Wentworth Letter states:
"We are informed by these records that America in ancient times has been inhabited by two distinct races of people. The first were called Jaredites and came directly from the Tower of Babel. The second race came directly from the city of Jerusalem about six hundred years before Christ. They were principally Israelites of the descendants of Joseph. The Jaredites were destroyed about the time that the Israelites came from Jerusalem, who succeeded them in the inheritance of the country. The principal nation of the second race fell in battle towards the close of the fourth century. The remnant are the Indians that now inhabit this country."
The Book of Mormon introduction states:
The book was written by many ancient prophets by the spirit of prophecy and revelation. Their words, written on gold plates, were quoted and abridged by a prophet-historian named Mormon. The record gives an account of two great civilizations. One came from Jerusalem in 600 B.C., and afterward separated into two nations, known as the Nephites and the Lamanites. The other came much earlier when the Lord confounded the tongues at the Tower of Babel. This group is known as the Jaredites. After thousands of years, all were destroyed except the Lamanites, and they are the principal ancestors of the American Indians.
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UPDATE (1:45 pm 11/26): I have gotten some interesting comments on this post, and the Historian has also responded on the Metaphysical Elders blog. I will respond to these responses later (and not in this post, which is already very long).
Tuesday, November 25, 2003
A Whole Lot More on Natural Law
In a mad attempt to throw together Kaimi's post on the "Christian Right" and Nate's post on natural law, while also tossing in a bit about Catholic and Protestant theology...
A few years ago I dug a little into a group called the World Congress of Families. It, like United Families International, has its roots in a loose network of politically conservative churches that saw the United Nations as beholden to an anti-traditionalist agenda. This is hardly a new complaint; it dates back to the 1960s and 70s, where you can find old John Birch Society stuff warning against the "unisex" and collectivist designs of the U.N. But it really seems to have picked up steam in the 1990s, perhaps because the weight of the Vatican and the Roman Catholic hierarchy really began to be added to the agenda (especially in regards to the role of U.N. agencies in promoting birth control and "family planning" (i.e., abortion rights)). Whatever the reason, a lot of groups joined the bandwagon. At some point in there, some LDS lawyers began participating, setting up their own parallel organizations and writing and publishing a lot on the anti-traditionalism implicit in the evolving international law regime. (Bruce Hafen gave a big speech at one of their conferences in Europe on the "natural" role of mothers and how the main U.N. documents of women's rights is either oblivious or hostile to that role.) Of course, with the Proclamation on the Family, it was probably inevitable that legally and politically savvy Mormons would see the opportunity to make an LDS contribution to this debate. They've done it nationally (like through the "Defend Marriage" movement), and continuing to do it on the international scene.
As I wrote yesterday, I'm bothered by a lot of the rhetoric these organizations usually use. If you check out United Families International's website, you'll see they define the family as "the natural and fundamental group unit of society." Now, maybe that's just boilerplate. But I don't think so--I think a great many of these folks probably really do think of the family as "natural": that is, the family (the traditional family, mind you) is "of nature." Such natural law discourse--which is, of course, what we're talking about here, whether or not any of these folks ever discuss the "laws" of nature--assumes nature has an enduring, objective normative status; it assumes that history (to say nothing of the human will) is separate from and in fact subservient to nature; it assumes that human beings, by virtue of being part of God's natural creation, can in fact reason out God's will by observing the natural facts implicit in that creation. This is (partly) the philosophy of Aristotle, and (more specifically) the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas, and it is a powerful way of thinking. But doesn't Mormonism believe a God--or at least, didn't we at one time believe in a God--who can, and does, intervene into our lives without making any reference to nature whatsoever? Was polygamy "natural"? Who knows? Is monogamy "more natural"? Again, who can say? Our theology, such as it is, arises from a series of divine edicts and pronunciations which have played themselves out across our own history, and the history of the ancient peoples discussed in the Bible and the BoM: "nature" never seems to come into it. (Though the authoritarian priesthood structure of contemporary Mormonism is quite in tune with the magisterial assumptions of current Roman Catholic theology, I for one am basically convinced that the Augustinian-Protestant emphasis on a direct, "a-natural" submission to God better suits what I think we are supposed to believe the prophets to have told us.) Thus, I don't think it's at all helpful in terms of building Zion (which involves intellectual work as well as physical) to take the basically conservative sensibility of most American Mormons and align that with arguments--against homosexuality, or against abortion rights, or in favor traditional family and sexual roles--which are premised solely upon the "fact" that gay sex, killing fetuses, and letting husbands stay home with the kids is "against nature."
Of course, natural law thinking is more subtle, and supple, than all that. I respect its power. I've used in plenty of times. It is a strong and persuasive and in many ways correct thing to be able to talk about "natural" forms of life, about the ordained telos of a being or a community. And who is to say that such nature-based theological discourse isn't the future of Mormonism? Medieval Christianity (or at least a good portion of it) turned to such philosophy because it helped them answer important questions, it was a way of making sense of how to live a Christian life in the public, and political, world. Mormonism may yet become philosophical, in a particular Roman Catholic sense: certainly a great many conservative Protestant churches have done so without realizing it (which gives no end of amusement to conservative Catholics, who have watched, over the last ten or fifteen years or so, many otherwise totally Americanized evangelical Southern Baptists suddenly "discover" John Henry Newman or Pope John Paul II (who is a hero of mine, I should note)). That may be our arc, and it is not, by definition, a bad or "apostate" one. The whole reason so many conservative Christians have embraced the idea of our time being "a Catholic moment" is that their Thomist tradition truly presents an intellectual alternative to the individualized spirituality of modern America. To the extent that Mormonism has been Americanized, discovering a different ontological frame within which one might politically situate one's faith can provide socially conservative Mormons with a great deal of solace. But still, I believe it is a tradition that we should not embrace too easily; there is, in the history of our doctrine and our ecclesia, too many differences that should not be elided, and that is exactly what I feel many "Christian Right" groups like United Families International are asking us to do when I read their stuff.
Though he doesn't call it such, Nate points out that Mormonism could articulate and pursue a "Protestant" alternative as well, one in which we "redefine the Good in personal [which is not the same as individualistic] terms." The force that binds together and to commends us to certain forms of life, in this case, would not be the moral imperative of the goodness of nature, but rather our willed covenant with God. I think this is a powerful idea, one much closer to my heart and my understanding of the Gospel; in particular, I like how Nate linked this to "what the scriptures (especially the Book of Mormon) are getting at when they talk about being "enticed" by both God and the Devil...[it is a question of] our affections and who it is that we ultimately want to be friends with." The concepts of will, covenant, and friendship implied therein might take different forms in Mormon hands, but they are all classic Reformation conceptions: Luther's writings on both the "bondage" and the "freedom" of our will; the Puritan and Calvinist doctrine of covenant; the whole idea of the church being a Gemeinde, a community of friendship. There are some real possibilities there. Then again, considering the many, many ways in which mainline Protestant congregations in the U.S. have failed to withstand the libertarian imperatives of modernity, perhaps covenant, when push comes to shove, isn't all it's cracked up to be: after all, it is exactly those devout conservative Protestants, who are most anxious about social conservative causes and most active in "Christian Right" organizations, who have most frequently given up on their own theology, and turned to Catholic doctrines of natural law.
A Quick Addendum
Two qualifications to the above: 1) I shouldn't imply that Roman Catholicism and natural law thinking are synonymous. The Thomist tradition is not only not the only philosophical tradition in Catholicism, it hasn't even always been the primary one. However, I do think it's fair to suggest that Roman Catholicism is the most philosophically developed of all bodies of Christian thought (at least insofar as we're dealing with what has usually been called "philosophy" in the West), and hence that those Christians who come on their own, by whatever route, to the belief that certain behaviors or relationships are "unnatural" in God's eyes usually find themselves, at least in my experience, turning sooner or later to papal encyclicals. 2) I don't mean to imply that all Mormon talk about the "natural family" and so forth is wholly the creation of various recent intellectual endeavors; I'm sure any search of the Ensign could turn up dozens of sermons by General Authorities in which this, that or the other thing is defended as not "merely" scriptural but also "natural" (meaning: "good"). And some LDS academics have been flirting with natural law reasoning for a long time: years ago there was a professor in the BYU political science department years ago, Richard Vetterli, who would hand out this pamphlet on "Homosexuality and the Natural Law" by Harry Jaffa to his classes.
Monday, November 24, 2003
Should Mormons consider the "Christian Right" as friends?
It seems to me that church members are becoming enamored of the political groups which are often identified "Christian Right" -- politically powerful, vocally conservative groups like the Family Research Council, American Family Association, and Focus on the Family. I receive many e-mail messages from family members, forwarding petitions or other communiques from such groups. Matt Evans, of our blog and other blogs' fame, has written about positive experiences he has had in communicating with one such group.
I can certainly see why Mormons are drawn to these groups. Such organizations are well-organized and able to wield political power. They appear to be "on our side" in the perceived culture wars. And if such groups disagree on doctrinal matters -- things like the nature of the Book of Mormon or of Joseph Smith -- well, those are little things which can be ignored for now. Right?
Despite these similarities, I am deeply doubtful that much good can come from these groups. It appears to me that, if such groups are prepared to send gays out of town on the first train -- a goal many church members would probably support -- that the groups are nevertheless also ready to send Mormons out on the second train.
For example, Professor Eric Rasmussen at Indiana caught a lot of flack for his suggestion that homosexuals not be permitted to teach. Christian groups weighed in supporting Rasmussen, and many Mormons may have felt that he was unfairly treated. However, in that very same discussion, Professor Rasmussen also suggested that Christians can rightly be opposed to "Hindus . . . atheists, Mormons, and so forth as teachers."
Similarly, I get frequent e-mails from church members (family and friends) urging me to support "school prayer." Yet a leading recent "school prayer" case was brought by a church member -- represented by the ACLU -- because LDS kids at school were being told their religion was wrong. (More on this in a future post).
I realize that these are anecdotal evidence. However, when combined with the inflammatory rhetoric of these groups, and the history of church persecution at the hands of other religious groups, I cannot help but feel suspicious. "Christian Right" groups may welcome our support now, but they are not our friends.
Perhaps church members are aware of these problems, but feel that, by supporting "Christian Right" groups, they can demonstrate to such groups that Mormons and fundamentalist Christians are not so different after all, and that our support now will lead to future support from these groups. I do not think that this is a realistic expectation. Most "Christian Right" groups appear from their rhetoric to be my-way-or-the-highway in outlook. We may be given a chance to join their inner circles -- provided we jettison the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith, temples, and most of our other unique beliefs. If we do not do so -- and I suspect that most church members would not wish this type of transformation -- then the day will come that the "Christian Right" groups will turn on us. Our earlier support for these groups will mean nothing, and we will be attacked as vociferously as their other targets are today.
I do not know if there is a way to avoid this future. However, my intuition is that, if such a future can be avoided, one key will be Mormons forging political alliances elsewhere, and refusing to lend political support to such "Christian Right" groups.
My (Mormon) Hang-up with (Opposition to) Gay Marriage
Hello all. My thanks for Nate for inviting me (if only for a while) to participate in this blog, and thanks for the introduction Kaimi. Speaking of such, I notice that Times and Seasons started off without any general explanations or identifying comments. Is that a policy, or just because it was assumed that most everyone who might read this blog would know who all the participants are? Either way, I feel foolish jumping into a conversation without doing a little of the usual sacrament-meeting-"let me tell you a little bit about myself"-routine. So anyway...my name's Russell Arben Fox; I'm married to Melissa Madsen Fox; we have two daughters, with a third due in about two weeks. I live in Jonesboro, AR, and teach political philosophy and other stuff at Arkansas State University. I'm originally from Spokane, WA; my wife is from Ann Arbor, MI; we met and married while students at BYU, which I attended from 1987-1994, with a break in there for a mission to South Korea. We've lived in the southern U.S. for either 2 1/2 or 8 1/2 years now, depending on if you include the Virginia suburbs of D.C. (where we lived while I worked on my Ph.D. at Catholic University of America) in "the South." Everything else you might want to know about me or my family can be found at either of the links Kaimi provided. Ok, that's enough.
Kaimi's post on gay marriage, and David Brooks's excellent conservative defense of such, puts me in mind of some long e-mail conservations I've had with many friends (both LDS and otherwise) over the last half-year or so. Looking back through my archives, it seems like there's been no single topic we've addressed more often than this one. And still my mind isn't made up. Put very simply, my dilemma is this: I consider myself to be a social conservative, and yet I am also Mormon, which is not entirely compatible with (or at least does not fit very well with, as far as I understand these things) social conservatism. Oh, it does match up very well in some ways, to be sure; but fundamentally, the sort of ontology necessary for a thorough social conservatism isn't--again, in my view--present in Mormon doctrine or Mormon history. For most moral issues, this needn't be a problem; but since the controversy over gay marriage has forced and/or encouraged both its supporters and its opponents to plumb the very depths of the social nature and/or construction of "traditional" or "natural" marriage, I can't help but feel, as a Mormon, somewhat on the spot.
Why? Because our history of polygamy prevents us, as far as I can tell, from speaking of heterosexual monogamy as either "traditional" or "natural," at least not in the same way many evangelicals, Catholics, and others have tended to talk about it. Mormons can adopt their language all they like, but until or unless church leaders announce (or at least tolerate the development of the idea) that 19th-century polygamy was wrong and/or a mistake and/or one of those crazy aberrant things, like God commanding Abraham to kill his son (except 19th-century Mormon men did, in fact, go through with marrying multiple women), I simply do not see how we can in good conscience defend a position which instantiates a particular definition of the family as intrinsically necessary or good or worthy. The reasoning, as far as I can tell, is pretty straightforward:
1. God is good.
2. God would not command His children to do something which did not partake of His goodness.
3. God commanded His church to practice plural marriage.
4. Therefore, polygamy must be something that, at least in some possible case, can result in goodness.
5. If polygamy can result in goodness, then the insistence that only "traditional" or "natural" forms of marriage--namely, heterosexual monogamy--can ever have good consequences is false.
6. Therefore, the moral argument for supporting heterosexual monogamy on the basis of its "traditional role" or its "naturalness" fails.
What does this necessarily have to do with gay marriage? Perhaps nothing. After all, as Gordon points out, the feelings of many Mormons towards the possibility of gay marriage may have more to do with a sense of its position on the "hierarchy of sins" than anything ontological. That is, maybe we can't theologically postulate a particular definition of marriage as "natural" (at least not without doing damage to our presumed belief that 19th-century prophets were, in fact, speaking as prophets when they defended plural marriage), but that doesn't mean we can't organize around especially heinous threats to its present form. But to my mind, such an argument would have to focus less on "marriage"--its qualities, history, civic role, legal context, cultural products, social benefits etc.--and more on the threat itself: that is, on (the sin of) same-sex relationships themselves. Which is why I tend to find it much easier to take seriously explicitly religious (either sectarian or phrased in natural religion/political theology-type terms) arguments about homosexuality and gay marriage--its ethical and spiritual dimensions, or lack thereof--than I do those arguments which follow along the predominant Christian/social conservative claims about "traditional marriage" on the basis of what one of my faithful LDS friends once called (perhaps unfairly) "post hoc secular rationales."
We are, for better or worse, a church committed to idea of revelation, an intervening God whose commands can, therefore, contravene our understanding of nature and tradition. (How many times did Joseph Smith essentially say, "If I told you everything God has told me, your world would shatter like glass"?) That being the case, it seems to me that the orthodox Mormon position is one which is open to the possibility that homosexuality poses a profoundly serious challenge to our moral condition, but which should be distrustful of anyone makes political arguments on the basis of defending any particular institutionalization of said moral condition. Of course, my use of the word "orthodox" is key there; as many have noted, orthodoxy is a moving target in Mormonism. It may well be that the revelatory worldview which I am attributing to Mormonism not only hasn't been strong for quite some time, but may be officially passing. Certainly the recent language of Elder Ballard and others in condemning same-sex marriage has been drenched with ideas of naturalness and tradition; when we have arrived at the point that Mormon judges can unironically cite Reynolds v. United States in convicting polygamists, then perhaps we have, as a church and as a people, gotten to the point where we feel comfortable understanding ourselves as defending a moral continuity, rather than as posing revelatory challenges to it. Whether this means that the legacy of plural marriage (to say nothing of Joseph Smith's involvement in polyandry) is going to be further marginalized in the church, or even be subject to more-or-less official revisionism (as has been the case in recent years regarding the at-one-time-prophetically-authenticated priesthood ban; consider how Armand Mauss, once considered a critic of the church, is now approvingly cited by those church defenders who want to put the "race issue" to rest), I can't say. But however things develop, if Mormon orthodoxy really is changing in this regard, then perhaps we can, as a faith, make a socially conservative argument for "traditional marriage" after all.
Ok, that's long enough. How's that for a first post?
Guest Blogger
We are happy to announce that Russell A. Fox will be coming aboard as a guest blogger for the next few weeks. Professor Fox teaches political philosophy, and posts at his own blog, Wäldchen vom Philosophenweg. He should be a welcome non-lawyer voice on the blog.
And remember -- statutes may prohibit one from rustling cattle (scroll down to 402(e)), but the common law may intervene* should one attempt to Rustle A Fox.
*Thanks to Nate Oman for reminding me of Pierson's potential applicability here.
Safe Site for Kids?
I was just at The Wiggles web site (The Wiggles is a television show that my children watch sometimes). The site has a prominently displayed Net Nanny approval sticker ("This Site is Safe for Kids"). It also has a prominently displayed link to the Australian Breastfeeding Association (careful: link includes breastfeeding pictures).
Huh? A Safe for Kids approved site which is a click away from topless women? I realize that breast-feeding is not the same as pornography, but I think many parents would prefer to control whether their children are viewing women's breasts.
And yes, I also realize that Net Nanny would probably block me (if I had it installed) if I tried to click the breastfeeding link. Still, a "kids site" which has a link button to a "boobies site" is a combination that strikes me as very puzzling.
Gay Marriage -- David Brooks and the Conservative Case
David Brooks recently laid out a conservative argument in favor of gay marriage. While Brooks echoes and expands on many arguments which have been floating through the blogosphere, his commentary is important for at least two reasons. First, Brooks is a well-known and identified conservative, with credentials including lengthy gigs at the Wall Street Journal and the Weekly Standard. It would be difficult to accuse him of being a liberal in conservative's clothing, which in turn means conservatives may be less prone to dismiss his argument by attacking the messenger. Second, Brooks lays out a rather well-reasoned argument that appeals to conservative values (though it arrives at a result which conservatives have opposed).
At its core, Brooks' argument is that opposition to gay marriage runs counter to the conservative ideal of fidelity and monogamy. If a gay couple wishes to be faithful and monogamous, Brooks suggests that society should do everything in its power to facilitate that desire -- including sanctioning gay marriage.
Perhaps most significantly, Brooks recognizes and agrees with the (generally conservative) perception that marriage is currently in crisis, as large numbers of marriage end in divorce. Many conservatives have suggested that allowing gay marriage will further weaken the institution of marriage (See, e.g., FRC here and the Weekly Standard here). Brooks begins with the same premise, that marriage is in crisis, but arrives at an opposite conclusion:
Still, even in this time of crisis, every human being in the United States has the chance to move from the path of contingency to the path of marital fidelity -- except homosexuals. Gays and lesbians are banned from marriage and forbidden to enter into this powerful and ennobling institution. A gay or lesbian couple may love each other as deeply as any two people, but when you meet a member of such a couple at a party, he or she then introduces you to a "partner," a word that reeks of contingency.
You would think that faced with this marriage crisis, we conservatives would do everything in our power to move as many people as possible from the path of contingency to the path of fidelity.
Brooks' argument raises interesting questions which are not addressed that I am aware of in Mormon theology. Specifically, is gay fidelity less sinful than gay promiscuity? The church teaches that homosexual acts are sinful. Are all homosexual acts between consenting adults equally sinful? (After all, sins can vary by degree.) Is a gay person who has sex with 10 different partners equivalent, as far as the church is concerned, to a gay person in a committed relationship who has sex with his/her monogamous partner ten times? Given that the church equates gay sex with most other kinds of immoral activity, is a gay marriage the equivalent to a long-term adulterous affair? And, is a long-term adulterous affair better than a string of one-night stands? (After all, if it is the number of sex acts that the church wishes to limit, perhaps opposition to marriage is a good idea, since many studies suggest that married or committed couples have sex more often than singles).
I am not sure of the answers to these questions. I am continuing to think about this issue, and am curious as to what others think. From a purely societal point of view, I think a committed partner is better than a promiscuous single. If we are seeking the societal benefits which come from stability, then Brooks' argument sounds appealing --
The conservative course is not to banish gay people from making such commitments. It is to expect that they make such commitments. We shouldn't just allow gay marriage. We should insist on gay marriage. We should regard it as scandalous that two people could claim to love each other and not want to sanctify their love with marriage and fidelity.
I find Brooks' argument rather persuasive, and remain unconvinced that Mormons should oppose gay marriage. I am certainly a skeptic of political opposition to gay marriage (I have previously written suggesting that Mitt Romney could sign a gay marriage bill into law without violating his religious beliefs), and Brooks' argument makes me wonder to what extent we should be opposed to the practice at all.
UPDATE: See also an aside by David Horowitz that appears to concede the same point. ("Personally, I believe the family is an institution under attack and needs to be defended, but I also believe that all citizens are deserving basic respect and individual rights and that society has a vested interest in recognizing and supporting stable relationships between consenting adults who do no harm.")
Saturday, November 22, 2003
Another post about hymns
Greg's recent post about hymns made me think again about an issue I've been reminded of every several months for the past two years.
I live in the Bronx, and my ward has somewhat unusual demographics. It is probably 60% African-American, including the Bishop and First Counselor, which I had never seen in a U.S. ward before. It is also very much a mission-field ward, with maybe a third of its members having belonged to the church for more than four or five years. With the ward's demographic mix and the members' relative lack of church experience, subjects like Blacks and the priesthood are particularly sensitive.
Two years ago, I was sitting in General Conference (priesthood session, as I recall) and we turned to page 59 to sing that old standard, "Come, O Thou King of Kings." I had probably sung it dozens of times before, never really paying much attention. We sang along up to verse four. Suddenly the text seemed to jump out of the page at me. I was sitting next to a newly-baptized African-American member, and hoped that he would be paying little attention, as we sang:
Hail! Prince of life and peace!
Thrice welcome to thy throne
While all the chosen race
Their Lord and Savior own
The heathen nations bow the knee
And ev'ry tongue sounds praise to thee.
The new member said nothing, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Nevertheless, I was horrified by the implied message of the lyrics, and especially how it must sound to African-American members who are aware of their only recent acceptance into the Priesthood. Perhaps I am being overly sensitive. I realize that there is more than one way to read this, and some are certainly innocuous. On the other hand, the proximity of "chosen race" to "heathen nations bow[ing] the knee" seems to imply ideas of racial superiority which may have existed in the church's past, and which the church is certainly trying to move beyond. (I don't think that other hymns which mention race, such as "If you could hie to Kolob," have the same clear implication.)
I immediately made a mental note to try to find out how one suggests a change to hymn lyrics. After all, if it was necessary to change "Yoo-Hoo Unto Jesus" and to modify "mighty thunder" (see hymn 86), this certainly seems to be a worthy candidate for change. And it's not like a delicate poetic structure would be interrupted -- the "chosen race" line does not even rhyme!
However, by the end of conference, I had forgotten my decision to find out about changing lyrics. And so a pattern began -- every six or eight months, it would come up in Sacrament Meeting, and I would say to myself "I need to remember to find out about that," and by the end of church I would have forgotten. In fact, it happened again last Sunday.
Greg's post finally made me think about hymn lyrics outside of Sacrament Meeting (which is possibly the most chaotic time of the week for me), and so I am writing this up.
The question I have, at this point, is how one goes about suggesting the church change the lyrics. I know at one point Michael Moody was in charge of church music -- is he still in charge, and does anyone know how to contact him? Or is there another route to use?
Let me emphasize that I do not know of anyone actually offended by these lyrics. However, they seem to be a disaster waiting to happen, especially in predominantly African-American wards like my own. (At least one other member of my ward has had the same concern with this hymn). (And, the problem is likely to be under-reported -- if the lyrics offended someone, they may be unlikely to state that to the Bishop, they might just leave. Or, the lyrics might add to the "total mix" of information and tip the scales for an investigator to decide that the church really is prejudiced against Blacks). My intuition is that it isn't worth keeping lyrics which might impair missionary work, when innocuous ones could be substituted.
Friday, November 21, 2003
Re: Suing the church
Adam asks if suing the church might place one in the category of "groups that oppose the church." He raises a question which, I think, does not have a yes-or-no answer.
My intuition is that the answer involves repeated use of the word qua. (See also here, third joke down, for the use of qua). To wit:
The church may be sued qua employer (put that aside for now). It may be in many other capacities. It may be sued qua tenant. It may be sued qua neighbor, or landowner, or contractor, and the list goes on and on. Finally, it may be sued qua church. The qua makes a difference.
Suing the church qua employer, tenant, neighbor, landowner, or contractor seems much less likely to trigger any membership problems. For example, if a church member is walking outside a church building and a negligently-placed brick falls and hits the member on the head, I don't see why the member could not bring suit against the church. Likewise if construction on a new church building ruptures a water main and floods a member's basement. And likewise if the church agrees to buy 100 suits from a member retailer, and then breaches the contract. The church may be a divinely-led organization, but it has a secular infrastructure which is not unlike any other infrastructure.
Separate from the secular infrastructure are church actions qua church. I may not bring suit for infliction of emotional distress when the Bishop tells me to repent. I may not sue the church over church policies which are divinely ordained (such as exclusion of women from the priesthood). Any such action would put me in the category of groups that oppose the church.
Finally, there are the mixed questions. For example, when the church is acting as an employer, it has a secular role, but may also be filling a religious role (and courts have upheld the religious aspect of church employment, see Corporation of the Presiding Bishop v. Amos. Whether Amos was rightly decided is a very complicated issue and beyond the scope of this post).
Those are my categories. From among those categories, it seems like baptism is a mixed question. It certainly has a religious purpose. On the other hand, I don't think it is unreasonable to require that the church make baptisms be, as a general matter, safe events. For example, if the church were conducting baptisms in water next to downed power lines, and someone were electrocuted, suing the church could be a proper recourse. Since baptism is a mixed category, and since the challenged aspect here is a secular portion of baptism (the safety of the font, rather than the validity of the prayer), a suit is not inappropriate.
UPDATE/EDIT: I should have mentioned when I originally wrote this, that Gordon's post about suing for breach of privacy in tithepayer status seems to be an instances of suing the church qua church, which is problematic. The case he cites, with a missionary who becomes ill, also appears to be suing the church qua church. (If the church were routinely exposing missionaries to highly unreasonable unsafe conditions, it might be different).
A Conversation with Mardell
My wife (without the impediment of legal training) was reading Nate's post regarding whether church members might be disciplined for suing the church and immediately suggested a line of reasoning that cuts to the chase:
Mardell: Let's go back to the temple recommend interview questions. "Have you sued a church member lately?" is not one of them!
Me: Is that following and obeying the leaders, though?
Mardell: It has nothing to do with the doctrine of the church -- it has everything to do with the leg that you broke!
I couldn't have said it better.
Thursday, November 20, 2003
More on Gossip and Tithing
Nate doubts that many people gossip about tithing, as I had previously suggested. Let me explain a bit more (this is awkward to discuss). It's certainly hard to pin down for me where I am being told information due to my calling, or where there is an over-sharing going on. I will give a few general examples of situations where it often arises:
Situation 1: Asking for help in callings.
Me: "We need a new [home teaching supervisor / primary teacher / assistant secretary / etc]."
Leader: "Hmm, I'm not sure if anyone is available. Do you have anyone in mind?"
Me: "Well, Brother X and Brother Y don't have callings."
Leader: "No, they can't. Brother X has problems with chastity, and Brother Y isn't paying tithing. . . "
Situation 2: Missionaries over for dinner.
Me: "So, how are things?"
Missionary: "Well, our recent baptism, brother Z, is having problems with [tithing / smoking / chastity / etc]."
[Often added, along the lines of] "And the worst part is, his brother / neighbor / friend is a member, but they don't pay tithing either!"
In both cases, I may be getting some information because of my calling, but I'm not sure (it varies, case by case). I know I do get lots of information about the ward members due to my calling. I am also certain that I get more than I should, because people have a hard time keeping things secret. There are certainly instances where information is shared to try to help, but it seems to me that in many instances the tone is more of "can you believe what Brother X is doing!" rather than "we need to help Brother X."
It is certainly more prevalent in my current ward than elsewhere that I've seen. This may be a function of being in a high-baptism, low-retention ward where members are constantly looking over each others' shoulders.
Utah, Tithing and Generosity
(Note: This is a cross-post with Seeking for Righteousness. I am joining in the trend of cross-posting, as others have done, as a temporary means of jump-starting the blog.)
Several people have posted online about Utah and generosity. There are posts by David Sundwall, here and here, a post by Nate Oman over here, an update by the very busy Matt Evans (who apparently has time to promote a pro-life organization, assist with an international charity outfit, and still post on blogs) here, and a detailed statistical analysis here. (It seems like most of the Mormons and Mormon-discussers have weighed in, though we still need to get Dave and Taint to opine).
I agree with much of what has been said by others. I especially think that David Sundwall's recent post is a nice balance of giving Mormons credit for their giving, while also noting valid concerns with attributing too much in the way of mental state to the tax-return chart.
Is Tithing Really Confidential?
I wanted to disagree, however, with one characterization made by Matt, Nate, and one of Matt's commenters. That is the polite fiction that nobody knows who pays how much tithing. I think this is fiction, of the same variety as many other phrases which church members perhaps wish were true, but often are not. (It is along the lines of "All investigators meet the Bishop or local leaders before baptism", or perhaps "Church basketball games can be a friendly, non-violent way to show a good example to non-members").
The reality is, first, that church members gossip, and one of the favorite topics is who is or is not keeping up. Members are very sharp-eyed, and will often start chatting immediately if a member stops going to the temple with the ward, or is released from a church calling for no apparent purpose. This is compounded by the fact that church leaders gossip. Not the First Presidency, of course, but gossip is endemic among local leaders.
I cannot count the number of times I have been told private, personal information by a bishopric member or elders' quorum presidency member, where is appears that the disclosure is for no reason other than to gossip. (As a member of the Elders Quorum presidency, I am often privy to personal information -- I mean instances beyond where my calling would suggest I need to know certain facts). There are numerous reasons for this, I am certain -- People like to name-drop, they like to show off that they have information, people are not good at keeping secrets. I am certain that I have, at times, engaged in such gossip myself (I don't remember specific instances, but gossip is like that -- and yes, I try not to). Information that I have been told (again, without apparent reason) includes members' tithepaying status. This has occurred in more than one ward (and I haven't been in the Elders Quorum presidency in other wards -- so there was no possible reason I should be privy to such information).
And, related to their gossip, church members ostracize and form cliques. Because of this reality, I am not convinced that social pressure does not coerce tithepaying. The idea that tithing is between the member and the Lord is certainly how things should be, but I think it is often not how they actually are.
