Thursday, November 7, 2019
Mormon Land Podcast - Review of Church Growth and Survey Data
Yesterday I participated in a podcast with the Salt Lake Tribute's series, Mormon Land, to discuss the findings of the survey data I presented last month at the annual meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion (SSSR) in St. Louis, Missouri. This podcast mainly reviews overall growth trends in the Church and by world region, as well as highlights from areas where the most rapid or most slow/stagnant growth occurs. Click here to listen to the podcast.
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I have seen reports of La Mora, Sonora, having 1,000 residents, while others say 3,000. While most are not members of the Church, it appears some have joined the real Church in recent years.
None of this week's victims were members, hence the official statement of the Church about the ambush.
It was either La Linea or Los Jaguares, different reports say.
Killing US citizens is a bad move.
I find the bringing up of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the contect of the massacre of residents of La Mora, Senora highly questionable. I am not convinced that a group that broke at least 95 years ago, on issues that at the latest break 115 years ago, and that has gone through multiple breaks and dividsions since the full break 95 years ago has enough connection to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to make the connection worth mentioning.
I am all the more confident of this view because the coverage of David Koresh and the Branch Dividians did not harp on their Seventh-Day Adventist origin. So much so I, who avidly followed at least radio news on that whole issue at the time, never head of the fact that Koresh had spiritual origins in the Seventh-day Adventist Church until about a year after the Oklahoma City bombing, which means three years after Koresh and company were murdered by ATC agents.
The time line for the Branch Dividians is actually shorter than for LeBaron's. LeBaron founded Colonia LeBaron in 1924, the Davidian Seventh-Day Adventist Church broke with the main Seventh-Day Adventist Church sometime in the early 1930s and founded their Waco, Texas colony in 1935. That gives us 37 less years seperating the Branch Davidians from the Sevnth-day Adventist.
That of course is still ignoring the fact that when Colonia LeBaron was founded it had been 20 years since the 2nd manifesto which said no new polygamy, even in places where it was legal.
Just to give a sense of how far we are removed, Mitt Romney's grandfather, contrary to some narratives, was a monogomous. He only married his second wife after his first wife died. This despite the fact that Mitt Romney is the 4th child in a family that was spread out quite a bit. He is also only a year younger than W. J. Clinton, G. W. Bush and Trump.
If the Branch Davidians were coverable without mentioning the Seventh-day Adventist Church, I question the motives and motivations of those who see a new to mention The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints at all in the context of the Mexico killings.
The mention of Ervil LeBaron and his killings in that context was even worse. It comes across the same as mentioning a black murder victim having a brother of their grandfather who was convicted of murder. Of course part of this is the work of evil "Under the Banner of Heaven", which would be like trying to blame modern African-Americans for the Nat Turner rebellio with its blaming the present people for the Mountain Meadows Massacre.
I think the confusion on the status of the US-born families living in Mexico being attacked in that particular area of the nation in question (at least as far as the media is concerned) is that the location where the attacks occurred was originally colonized by members of the Church, so when most media outlets heard about the attacks, they jumped to an incorrect conclusion in that respect that those attacked must have had ties to the Church. That is why the Church released the following statement regarding that tragedy:
https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/church-statement-mexico-tragedy-2019
Hope this information helps.
As I have explained to multiple co-workers this past week that the victims were not members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints nor does the Church count them as so, the gist of my comment is whether La Morita (as people call it) has 1,000 or 3,000 people. Also, I read that some in that community apparently have joined the real Restored Church, or at least family related to them spread out elsewhere.
People's misconceptions of the faith are so endemic that it is virtually impossible to separate legitimate Mormons from "offshoot Mormons", ironically a nickname eschewed by our prophetic leader. I am sure Christians dealt with similar issues throughout their history, especially in their first 200 years of existence.
We pray for the safety of Mexicans and people everywhere.
Oh, and to further clarify to any who may misinterpret: members and followers of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also referred to as Mormons, to the chagrin of many, undoubtedly consider themselves, ourselves, as Christians, followers and believers of Jesus Christ.
Ironically, our church once spent considerable time and effort trying to explain to the media that *we*, not any of the offshoot groups and especially not the polygamist ones, were the only ones who should be referred to as "Mormons". Even tried to copyright the term, if I recall correctly.
KSL had someone from the Maxwell Institute on Tuesday who did lay out these groups. They are typically those that split off no later than Joseph F. Smith's presidency, as he was the president who last had any polygamy during his lifetime, he was not practicing it, but in 1904 the 'Little Manifesto' was released that shut it down worldwide.
So we still had these after that, they were not considered members after that, although if you go where they meet you will only find the pictures of the first six presidents of the church up to Joseph F. Smith.
Not sure what else they still practice or try to practice. Eventually ABC went to 'fundamentalist Mormons' in the reporting.
This hit home in my ward, one of the cousins of a ward member was one of the mothers killed. I live by Downtown Provo
Ervil LeBaron died in back in 1981. Since then a number of his descendants/followers have tried to return to their LDS roots and limiting themselves to traditional monogamous relationships. In the late 1980's I briefly dates one of the Langford girls from Sonora that I met as a YSA ward in Southern California (a probably relative to all of the Langford victims.) My heart really goes out to that family right now.
As Americans we should work on stopping illegal drug flow, not consuming it or hopefully reporting or helping those that do. In Mexico, the danger is tangible. Ending illegal drug trading is a mammoth effort. It affects our societies very negatively.
We do and share and preach what we can.
Oh yes: Ideas on the population of La Mora, Sonora?
KSL said about 800, it is on a dirt road south of Agua Prieta. Not on a Mexican Federal route, as those have checkpoints run vy the military at regular intervals.
James Anderson, Joseph F. Smith did practice polygamy earlier, I think (per Wikipedia) that he was married to 4 or 5 women at once, two of whom were sisters. One of the Lambson sisters was the mother of future prophet Joseph Fielding Smith, her sister's son was apostle Hyrum M. Smith, Pres. Ballard's grandfather.
In spite of the 2nd Manifesto, ending contracting new plural marriages, members and leaders still rightly considered that they had a moral duty to support existing plural wives and children, which may be the cause of my last point, below:
Wikipedia sometimes seems to present matters relating to the church so as to be as unfavorable as possible- though it seems unlikely to me that they're making this up: in 1906, two years after the 2nd Manifesto, Pres. Smith was charged with and pled guilty to unlawful cohabitation, and paid a fine.
Christopher Nicholson - They trademarked the word "Mormon" (not just 'tried to copyright the term'). In 2014 there was a lawsuit involving a dating website that wanted to name their site "Mormon Match" and the church's intellectual property arm Intellectual Reserve, Inc., which manages trademarks for the church. The church's reservation was that the name for the dating website would create consumer confusion about whether the church was sponsoring the website or whether the website was owned by the church.
It is a difficult trademark to enforce. For instance, if the church tries to enforce the trademark against some groups (e.g. anything to do with the Book of Mormon musical) then there would definitely be a lot of negative publicity, but at the same time the church wants to protect its brand and not have people think the church sponsors certain websites or companies. It became a cost/benefit analysis about whether it was worth the negative publicity to try to enforce the trademark against certain actors. I know there were a lot of considerations involved in figuring out how to address this issues, but conveniently switching the focus of the church away from the term "Mormon" goes a long way in avoiding some of the conflicts.
I read one article where they interviewed a scholar who studies the polygamists of northern Mexico and elsewhere. I think she was saying there are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in La Mora, but she didn't phrase it that way so it was confusing.
Equally important to realize is that people need to pay close attention to time tables. Colonia Juarez where the temple is and Colonia Dublan where Sen Romney's father was born were founded by members of the Church in full agreement with leaders before the 1st manifesto.
Most plural marriages between the 1st and 2nd manifesto in Mexico, including that of Henry B. Eyring's grandfather to a sister of Mitt Romney's grandfather, were done with the sanction of Church leadership.
On the other hand after 1904 no new polygamy is authorized. Still the origins of places like Colonia LeBaron and La Mora postdate 1920 and the dislocations of the Mexican revolution.
A final fun fact is there are to US citizen by birth general authorities at present who were raised in northern Mexico, one I know in Sanora, and the other I believe in that general area.
These are not Anglos though. One is Adrian Ochoa, who I have never pinned down where in Mexico's rural north he was raised.
The other is Hugo Montoya. He was born in Fresno but raised in Caborca in the Sanoran desert, but I think his family emran a vineyard there, which probably relates to why they were in Fresno.
Caborca is significantly further west than the colonies. The few in Sanora are right on the border with Chihuahua. Caborca has a district not yet a stake. I think it was just one branch when Elder Montoya was being raised there. Hugo Montoya is the 4th great-grandson of Rafael Monroy, the martyr of San Marco's. He was branch president there in 1915 killed during the Mexican revolution in part because of his faith. San Marcos is in central Mexico.
Further notes on the Mormon colonies. Elder Arnulfo Valenzuela was raised in the colonies and graduated from Juarez Academy. I might be wrong, but he might be the only current general authority who did that. As you probably can tell he is not Anglo.
Elder Benjamin de Hoyos was born in Monterrey but I believe his father had grown up in or near the Mormon colonies.
When Camilla Eyring (later Kimball) was a student at Juarez Academy her Spanish teacher was a Brother Gonzalez, at the time one of the few Latinos in the colonies. He had an Anglo wife. Brother Gonzalez's grandson Clate Mask Jr. Was a general authority starting sometime in the 1990s. After the revolution sent them to El Paso the family stopped using Spanish. Elder Mask thus had to learn Spanish as a missionary.
The first Latina matron of the Colonia Juarez Temple was Raquel Lopez de Whetten. She was raised in California while her husband was raised in Mexico. He was a general authority. They also presided over the Ascuncion Paraguay Mission where her predecessor as mission mom was also Latina. That was Sister Allred later in the Relief Society general presidency.
This I still think is the right view. Any other view confuses etymology with meaning. When the media say "Mormon missionaries" and especially "Mormon Church" they create an idea of one group. No one ever called David Koresh an "adventist".
Actually Joseph F. Smith practiced polygamy. As he would tell anyone, the covenants made in the temple were non-revojable, and he was under all such obligations to all his wives.
The only post-manifesto sealing that was semi polygamous that Joseph F. Smith did involved a 2nd marriage where one party was deceased. On the other hand he or others in the first presidency basically understood the manifesto to ban new plural marriages only in the US and that in Mexico new such marriages could be performed.
Only the 2nd manifesto of 1904 made new plural marriages non-acceptable and forbade them. It was only after that that new plural marriages lead to excommunication.
The era was tricky in large part because breaking covenants was not acceptable. This led to two views.
The government view was that the Harrison pardon of 1892 covered all actions before than but forbade any action after. This is why Heber J. Grant was sent to prison in 1898 because his 3rd (and 2nd living) wife Emily Wells (whose full brother was then governor of Utah) had a daughter, whom they named Frances Marion. She
Married Wallace F. Bennett who would look after be a US senator as would their son Robert.
Elder Grant would have considered himself protected by the pardon but that is not how federal officials saw it. More importantly he was under covenant obligations to treat both Augusta and Emily fully as wives. His first wife was dead by then.
By the time President Grant became president of the Church Emily had died and only Augusta was still alive.
In the 1930s in some areas like Short Creek the Church made all members proactively swear they denounced polygamy and refusal to so swear was seen as grounds for excomunication.
One last thing to bear in mind. Polygamy is not the only cause of break with those in groups like the Church of the First born, FLDS, Aposolic United Brethren and others.
Other issues that have been used to go on the attack include the Adam-God theorem, attacks on The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for no longer sending missionaries without purse or script (not that most polygamist groups send missionaries at all) and also more proactive attempts to live the law of consecration.
In 1978 after the revelation on the priesthood there were some polygamists groups that tried to recruit those who disagreed with it. I have heard conflicting accounts on how successful this was. In the broad picture it was not. There is a polygamist Church that was formed in 1978, but that was in April so it was not formed as a reaction to the revelation on the priesthood.
There are also people like Denver Snefler who fit many definitions of "dundamentalist" but do not advocate polygamy. Snefler though seems to want to deny Joseph Smith was polygamist. He also seems to not understand that societal commandments can change and rejects the current status of the Word of Wisdom. Those who have problems with a changing Word of Wisdom need to understand that the law of Moses and its dietary provisions were imposed by God and also revoked.
Articles on Brigham Young and Joseph Fielding Smith need to be edited to avoid over focus on one issue.
On the other hand I am not sure Wikipedia would let us include in the article on Brigham Young his appearing in vision to J. W. Billy Johnson, the spiritual father of the Church in Ghana, sometime in the mid-1970s, and encouraging him to continue building the Church. Although since it was reported in an article in the Salt Kake Tribune in 2018 it can be sourced to something that is by any and all definitions a 3rd party source.
I am still a little miffed that the article on Benjamin de Hoyos was deleted, my inclusion of 3rd party coverage of his urging the Church in Mexico to stand against the legal recognition of same sex marriage was not enough. The article on Peter M. Johnson stayedwhich may show systemic bias for the US and against those elsewhere.
As far as I can tell the only Wikipedia article on an apostle that ever faced a deletion discussion after their call was the one on Ulisses Soares.
Wikupedia rules on sourcing plus different levels of internet digitization make it easier to save articles on Americans.
Some editors try to claim that for members of the Church no publication of the Church is independent of them. This is just a case of going beyond the pale when it is applied to try to exclude articles published by BYU studies as qualifying as 3rd party reliable sources.
On the other hand, if I am write that the bio of Camilla Kimball was published by Bookcraft, before Deseret Book bought it, than the fact it was co-authored by her son is probably overcome and we could probably create an article on Camilla Kimball in Wikipedia under the has a published biography of them notability guideline
Oddly enough Flora Benson has an article but Camilla Kimball lacks one. I am pretty sure Camilla had a bigger public profile. Well, except in rye he 1940s when Ezra Taft Benson was the most publicly well known member of the Church, and the Bensons did family night on national TV.
My first attempt to create a Wikipedia article was on Phoebe Woodruff back in 2006. It ended in deletion. My next was on Bruce C. Hafen that also nearly ended in deletion because I did not yet understand how key providing sources was. Later there was the article on Alexander Schreiner that went to deletion because I saved it before I had included all the sources I had. At that point I said "I have not yet begun to cite." The article on Schreiner survived. If anyone tries to remove it again one could deploy Michael Hicks "biography" of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.
I don't have that book anymore because I grew tired of his treatment of LGBT issues, including connecting events to them that the most knowing participants have denied link at all. I also thought a lot of his textual exegesis failed. I think he read the 1St Nephi passage on angels ",in the attitude of singing and praising God" as not invoking music wrongly. Also some of his exegesis of Boyd K. Packer's statements on hymns were built around the unjustified assumption that Elder Packer was using hymn in a narrow musical sense. Elder Packer was not a professional musician, let alone a scholar of musicology, so I think to take anything he said to mean no singing religious anthems in Church was reading the material wrong.
Based on President Nelson's statements I am confident trademark law had zero to do with his considerations.
On the other hand considering the Book of Mormon remains considered the keystone of our religion, the problem with a racist, neo-colonialist musical using the name to marginalize Ugandans and advance colonialist and neo-colonialist ideas, is very big.
However I think the biggest reason is some uses are more likely to cause confusion. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints still has the trademark on the term "Mormon".
JPL, I want you to know I understand your frustration in matters relating to Wikipedia. In comparison to you, I know that, insofar as I am aware, not all the articles I originally created have been targeted for deletion. While I cannot speak to how articles you originally created were edited, I know that at times, I requested help on articles I had originated on the relevant project page. If you have not done that, I'd advise you to do so.
As I have observed previously, the main problem (and the reason so many articles about the Church have been deleted from Wikipedia) is that there is not enough sufficient support from enough editors who are willing to work within or fix what is wrong with the relevant guidelines and policies. And if there was enough support to do that, it is likely that previously-deleted articles could easily be restored, and that articles created once that happens would likely be able to be preserved.
I know I have tried to work behind-the-scenes with editors with whom I have interacted in prior deletion discussions to try some suggested fixes, but the reality of it is is that, unless more people get on board to go through that process, through either private discussions or more public efforts in appealing to the powers-that-be, then the deletion of articles about the Church may effectively remain the status quo. That should not be the case, but until the problems are fixed in the correct way by trying to work within and around the current policies, and to either fix or amend them where possible, there will be no change.
Insofar as I am aware, I am one of the few who has actually been approached about possible fixes due to my interactions in previous deletion discussions. So, with all due respect, my suggestion to you is that your time might be better spent trying to help work around or fix these issues as they now stand instead of complaining about them in such settings as here. I mean no offense here, and I hope none is taken, but if a system is broken, and people aren't willing to work in and around it to generate satisfactory fixes, then large-scale complaints about such issues in settings such as this likely won't help. That said, I have the highest respect for you personally, and understand your frustrations on this issue, but wanted to lay this out for your to consider here.
And I hope that, by extension, this comment may not only serve to help you, JPL, but also those reading your comments and mine who may, upon seeing them and understanding what we're up against, may be willing to join in the efforts to try to help fix the broken system in this case. And if that can happen, and if those fixes can be applied, there will be less to complain about, both on Wikipedia and outside of it. Thanks.
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