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Failed is the asked question? In my opinion it is a fair question. You addressed Majoun.
My question stands as:
Does he believe that God punishes people by darkening their skin?
If he has answered that question before in some form or another, I would like a link to read it for myself.
The quotes from the Book of Mormon are from a website I am not affiliated with...so I did not write the statements in the site or the Book of Mormon.
I have a number of thoughts on the matter, but you're opting out of the bigger point that I'm making.
"Blacks are subhuman and blacks were made by God to be slaves to whites" is significantly more racist than "Blacks can't have the priesthood yet."
Now if you want me to dig up the racist past of any other religion, I'll be happy to do so.
If you want to find material that sensationalizes and demonizes Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, Muslims and Jews, a simple Google search will do. Supposedly, Jews practice blood libel even to this day. These are four religions that, in my experience, people desperately want to believe are more evil that the devil himself. Any nasty little rumor they hear is fact simply because they want to believe that Mormons, Jews, Jehovah's Witnesses and Muslims are inherently evil. Never has made much sense to me to be perfectly honest, but that's the way it is.
Ultimately, you're playing racial bigotry against religious bigotry. If you want to go there, I would suggest that you do a helluva lot more research on both the history of Mormonism and the history of racism. Most hate groups who have something against Mormons are affiliated with religions that have a much, much uglier past history.
This ridiculous thread is not going to change one thing: Ron Paul remains my first choice for POTUS.
Romney was active in the Mormon church when it was openly racist and white supremacist. The LDS church would not admit blacks in until 1978, when Romney was 31.
That is not true. Blacks have always been allowed to join the Church, Mormons have always had integrated congregations. Men of African descent were not allowed to hold the Church's priesthood for a number of years, but that policy was not in effect in the beginning. Joseph Smith (Mormonism's founder) personally ordained at least one Black man to the LDS priesthood, and one of the primary reasons Mormons were driven out of Missouri was that they were strongly abolitionist. The ban against Black men holding the Church's lay priesthood was instituted as a policy under Brigham Young, and clearly some of the Church's early leadership was racist. While Black men did not have all of the rights White men had in the Church for a number of years, this was a matter of policy (misguided policy, in my opinion) and not a matter of official doctrine. Many people in the people were opposed to the policy and were absolutely thrilled when it was overturned. Finally, to even refer to the policy as one of "White Supremacy" is inaccurate, since men with darker skin than many African-Americans were allowed to hold the priesthood during the years when even lighter-skinned African-Americans were not. It was a policy based on lineage rather than skin color, and it was not a policy all Latter-day Saints were comfortable with.
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He never criticized the policies of the church before they changed. There was already a movement within Mormonism to admit blacks and drop the white supremacy when Romney was at BYU, but he did not support said movement.
I'm not sure what you're talking about, but then neither are you. Since Church policy has never been determined by majority vote, even those who were opposed to the policy would have recognized the futility of challenging it. They knew it would be overturned at some point in time and were simply glad when it happened. The likelihood that you would have any inkling what Romney's personal feelings were about the Church's pre-1978 policy is virtually non-existant.
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Paul has never belonged to a racist organization. Romney belonged to a racist organization. (And, yes, I know Robert Byrd also did, but Byrd's dead, not running for office, and Byrd's ancestors didn't help found the Klan as Romney's ancestors helped found the LDS Church.)
To compare the LDS Church to the KKK is absolute nonsense. As a matter of fact, to do so makes you look even more prejudiced than you are claiming Romney is.
Does he believe that God punishes people by darkening their skin?
I doubt very much that he does. Anti-Mormon websites love to pull these three passages of scripture out of the Book of Mormon to prove that Mormons are racists. The fact it, all of them are presented out of context, and without the footnotes which explain the correct interpretation within LDS doctrine. They also inevitably neglect to mention the following passage:
2 Nephi 26:33 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.
I could post at least a half dozen more verses of scripture from the LDS canon in which we are told that God does not base His love and acceptance for His children on their skin color. If you want to discuss the matter further, however, I suggest you go to the Christianity forum to do so.
My question stands as:
Does he believe that God punishes people by darkening their skin?
If he has answered that question before in some form or another, I would like a link to read it for myself.
I suspect he's never been asked the question, to be perfectly honest. After all, it does kind of represent an uninformed perspective of what Mormons actually believe.
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The quotes from the Book of Mormon are from a website I am not affiliated with...so I did not write the statements in the site or the Book of Mormon.
You may not be affiliated with the website in question, but you chose to trust it as an accurate source of information. Since it is a blatantly anti-Mormon website, you might want to take a look at what some of the many Black Mormons today have to say about the Church's pre-1978 priesthood ban. I'm sure the insight they can provide you is every bit as accurate and reliable as what you've been reading.
I suspect he's never been asked the question, to be perfectly honest. After all, it does kind of represent an uninformed perspective of what Mormons actually believe.
You may not be affiliated with the website in question, but you chose to trust it as an accurate source of information. Since it is a blatantly anti-Mormon website, you might want to take a look at what some of the many Black Mormons today have to say about the Church's pre-1978 priesthood ban. I'm sure the insight they can provide you is every bit as accurate and reliable as what you've been reading.
Hey, I thank you for the link. I am bookmarking it for later reading. I do like learning more about others beliefs.
As for my question... it is a question of his character. I agree it could be taken as me attacking the whole LDS faith. I don't know of another way to word it though. All candidates are fair game for questions of character. The Ron Paul Newsletters have been questioned and answered to death... then asked again. Mine is a new question to a different candidate. Apparently it is not taken as such.
When someone is trying to get an answer, one way to approach it is to ask a question. That is what I was trying to do. The answer would be up to Mitt Romney due to it being about his personal beliefs.
Hey, I thank you for the link. I am bookmarking it for later reading. I do like learning more about others beliefs.
You're welcome. And thank you for your willingness to look into more than one side of the issue. By the way, you may find this Black History Timeline particularly interesting. It's a side-by-side comparison of Black LDS history and Black history in America in general. Clearly, the Latter-day Saints were far from being the most racist folks around.
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As for my question... it is a question of his character. I agree it could be taken as me attacking the whole LDS faith. I don't know of another way to word it though. All candidates are fair game for questions of character. The Ron Paul Newsletters have been questioned and answered to death... then asked again. Mine is a new question to a different candidate. Apparently it is not taken as such.
And I apologize if I was unreasonably critical. I did take it as an attack on the LDS faith, of which I'm a member. It's hard not to when you have as strongly anti-racist feelings as I do. Since I'm just two or three years younger than Mitt Romney and was raised Mormon, I'd just like to share with you my own feelings about the day the priesthood ban was lifted. I can remember it like it was yesterday, even though I was just 29 years old at the time. I came from a practicing LDS family, where we were taught to respect all human beings and to never judge someone by the color of his skin.
It was in June, 1978. I was at work at an ad agency in downtown Salt Lake City, literally a block away from LDS Church headquarters. I guess someone must have had his or her radio on at the time the announcement was made, because it spread like wildfire throughout the agency. There had been absolutely no hint that a change was in the works, so it came as a complete surprise to everyone. It was just before lunch. When I heard, I was absolutely speechless. I was so excited that I knew it would be pointless for me to continue trying to work. I left for lunch a few minutes earlier than usual and walked alone across the street to the main downtown shopping mall. As I crossed the street, I was aware of this huge smile stretching across my face from ear to ear. I remember feeling kind of self-conscious about it and wondered what people would think about this crazy woman grinning so big her face was likely to crack. At first, I made a concerted effort at wiping the smile off my face, but then I happened to look around me. Everybody was smiling! I've never seen anything quite like it! I'm not going to lie and tell you that every Mormon in the world was happy to hear the news. Some Mormons actually left the Church when the ban was lifted. But I can tell you from first-hand experience that the vast, vast majority of them felt just like I did. I have no reason whatsoever to think Romney felt any less happy that day than I did.
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When someone is trying to get an answer, one way to approach it is to ask a question. That is what I was trying to do. The answer would be up to Mitt Romney due to it being about his personal beliefs.
You're right. Thank you for asking it. I hope my answer has helped shed some light on the subject.
i dont think romney is a racist, he appointed non white judges in mass and has never come across giving me that opinion.
romneys problem is an identity issue. he is like 2 face in batman.
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