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I received a very angry and confused email from my good friend in India in response to the following article: Now, Mormon church in US baptises Mahatma GandhiRoughly 1.2 billion people revere Gandhi as the father of their nation, and one whose sacred memory must not be defiled. He was opposed to evangelism of all kinds. the article concludes:
Times of India wrote:“He thought people must decide for themselves which religion they want to follow and they should follow that religion. It’s not up to others to force them. He was respectful of all the religions.” Suhag Shukla of Washington-based Hindu America Foundation said, “The proxy baptism of Gandhi is deeply offensive, not only to Gandhi’s legacy as a devout Hindu, but to Hindus world over.”
This is not helpful, really, to the acceptance of the gospel by Indians. Sure, it could open up a dialog that says that we revere Gandhi and want him to recelve the same blessings as we have. But such a thing is not done in Asian cultures anywhere. Descendents revere their ancestors (more so in China than India), and the responsibility for such reverence is with the family and not some proxy around the world. It’s defiling to the memory for someone outside of family and culture to do such a thing.Moreover, the person who outed this proxy baptism, a disaffected, ex’ed person of Indian origin, noted in the article that the evidence of the proxy baptism disappeared from the record shortly after discovery. So here we have a political blunder, followed up by a cover-up.
Sometimes I just cringe. The reality is probably simpler: someone well meaning, or not, put in gandhi’s name, did the work, and then a disaffected Indian ex-member did some searches to see whether any famous dead indians were in there. It happens. Indian press loves sensationalism and doesn’t fact-check. One would hope, though after a couple really embarrassing episodes with holocaust victims that the Church might get some sense as to how to handle these things.
I guess I get why people get upset about this kind of thing, but it’s not really a very rational response (not that getting upset ever is). Am I allowed to think your name? Am I allowed to say your name out loud? Am I allowed to think about and/or say the names of any of your ancestors? I sit okay for me to say “blah blah blah wayfarer’s great-great-grandmother blah blah blah”? This is ostensibly what the big deal is about. What if baptism for the dead consisted of TSM sitting in the temple and thinking the names written on a piece of paper which was then summarily burned, or names that simple popped into his head, and no record was ever kept? Would people still be upset about their ancestors being baptized for the dead? I think what they’re really upset about is “us” thinking “our” religion is better than “theirs”, and that ain’t gonna be changing any time soon. I agree that this is highly offensive to people, just like the example of the Holocaust victims. I really do. At heart, it can’t be seen as anything but arrogant by those who aren’t part of it. I get that. Now, the inevitable “however” . . .
1) I think most of it is a result of a fundamental misunderstanding of the difference between baptism in the LDS Church and baptism in other Christian denominations. In other churches, a baptism is a choice made prior to the baptism happening, and, since there is no concept of a “preliminary baptism, subject to acceptance later”, baptizing someone else is seen as a violation of choice. Thus, people see baptizing others who have died as a violation of choice when, in principle, it isn’t.
2) Was the baptism cancelled (rather than “hidden”) once it was known to SLC? I don’t know; that’s a sincere question. That is, I believe, what happens when Holocaust victims are baptized – like happened again recently. In those cases, I believe the baptism is nullified, since it was forbidden in the first place. (just like if someone baptizes a 5-year-old) I might be wrong about that in this case, but it might be a nullification, not a “cover up”.
3) If I were a non-member, and if something like this happened with someone I know and/or revere, and if I understood Mormon doctrine better than most people do,
I would be FAR more upset about the confirmation than about the baptism.I could understand the general concept of baptism for the dead, but I would have a hard time understanding the idea that a church continues past death. I’m a firmly believing member, and even I don’t see it that way. I’m OK with the practice of temple confirmations (since I can view it all symbolically), but I absolutely can understand why others would be upset about it. 4) Finally, where would we draw the line? Do we stop baptizing everyone whose kin or nationality might get upset about it?
That would include just about everyone.If so, we might as well shut down the temples completely – and I absolutely don’t want that happening. The concept and principle of universal opportunity for salvation and exaltation is one of my favorite aspects of Mormonism – and I really do love the embodiment of that in the vicarious ordinances for the dead. Do we only stop baptizing celebrities and famous people – those whose names are easily recognizable? That just doesn’t sit well at all with me. I’d rather shut down the temples than say, “We’ll baptize all individuals whose work won’t cause a scene, but we’ll skip all those famous people whose work might do so.” Honestly, I really am torn on this one a bit – since I don’t want to gut one of my favorite aspects of Mormonism. In many ways, my choice would be to have the Church issue a press release laying out exactly why we perform temple ordinances (with a Biblical justification), that there is no aspect of coercion or lack of choice in the practice, that the ordinances are not seen as binding in any way for those involved and that we won’t stop doing something we believe has been commanded by Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. I’d rather have a strong statement saying, essentially, “This is a core element of our theology, and we won’t back down from it.”
I know that would not help our missionary work with some people, but I think it actually would with others – and I just see it as the right things to do, if we really do believe in the concept and principle of the work done in the temple (even if we see it as purely symbolic).
A Jewish friend of mine explained it this way Imagine if a Rabbi said that Joseph Smith Jr. was now initiated in the Jewish religion now that he was on the other side of death. And because of that his whole life, all the work he stood for and his death are now worthless. She then asked me if the LDS membership would be upset…I said well they’d poop kittens…She said it’s exactly the same thing when members do this to others.
Arwen, fwiw, part of my heterodoxy is that I wouldn’t care one bit if that happened – as long as the reasoning behind it wasn’t mean-spirited. I have a patient that’s submitted somewhere between 250,000-300,000 names that he’s extracted from records over the internet from his home country. I used to think that was pretty cool but now I’m not so sure. I wonder if the construction of all the small temples has driven the process rather than being there to respond to the need. I would be upset if someone dug my grandpa out of his grave and did something with his corpse. Well, maybe I would be, I don’t know, but I suppose I’d be justified in being upset. If somebody wants to write a song about him, burn him in effigy, make a Macy’s parade balloon in his image, or, god forbid, draw a cartoon of him, or pretend that he belonged to a religion that he never belonged to, what’s the big deal? It’s only meaningful if it means something to you. Otherwise it’s just mumbo jumbo. What these people are saying, in effect, is that LDS proxy baptism is in some way valid and/or meaningful.
GB, I think the theology and the belief of the members in that theology has driven the need, along with the enhanced technology available to so many. I might be wrong, but I really do think it’s not any more complicated than that.
doug, I agree that they are acting as if it is valid or meaningful – but I think they are acting out of pure outrage and emotionalism (and I think it’s understandable, given how little most people know about the actual theology).
Ironically, I do think there probably would be some members who would get upset if evangelicals started claiming, somehow, that our Mormon ancestors were now evangelical – but I think (hope) most of them would shrug and not care much (ironically, because they wouldn’t see it as valid or meaningful or binding in any way). I think the only “valid” criticism would be if it was done mockingly or in a mean-spirited way – if it obviously wasn’t sincere and was based on inauthentic beliefs. Otherwise, I say, “Have at it, everyone. No skin off my nose.”
However, I can’t expect someone who doesn’t understand my theology to understand that attitude, either. I really do understand why this is repulsive and upsetting to others, so I can’t get upset at their outrage – or even be surprised.
One of the many issues the LDS Church is going to have to deal with, on a theological level, because of being in the spotlight these days. It was all fine and dandy when nobody gave a crap about what those Mormons did over there in their little desert mountain refuge. The usual response of just ignoring problems isn’t gonna fly anymore.
Old-Timer wrote:GB, I think the theology and the belief of the members in that theology has driven the need, along with the enhanced technology available to so many.
I remember Jan Shipps at a Seattle Sunstone conference about 15 years ago talk about how she saw the emphasis changing for the members to become temple attending. Having an increase in the numbers of temples has increased the number attending but I’m not so sure about those contributing to the name pool with individual family names. When there were just a few temples people made the trips for themselves for marriages and sealings and to do names they’d researched and saved up but I’m not so sure that outside the corridor people made the trip just to go like they’re able to do now. I think this is one of the things that gave rise to extraction where names are made available for ordinances and not just for family research.
Yeah, I think you’re probably right about that, GB. This just shows how kooky this whole doctrine of work for the dead is to people outside the church. If this is offensive for famous names or groups of people, how is it not offensive for all people? Could we ever possibly see a time where this is only allowed for immediate family and no others? Would we run out of names? How would temple ceremonies be done without new names? Perhaps the Church would allow us to go through with symbolic names, realizing we will never be able to actually get the whole human race, and shouldnt do it for people who can’t give consent, and just have faith these things get worked out in the hereafter, we don’t need to literally baptize the world.
Heber13 wrote:If this is offensive for famous names or groups of people, how is it not offensive for all people?
Could we ever possibly see a time where this is only allowed for immediate family and no others? Would we run out of names? How would temple ceremonies be done without new names? Perhaps the Church would allow us to go through with symbolic names, realizing we will never be able to actually get the whole human race, and shouldnt do it for people who can’t give consent, and just have faith these things get worked out in the hereafter, we don’t need to literally baptize the world.
I think names are already being recycled on a regular basis, and I guess it is conceivable that at some point in the future there will be literally no more names to dig up from past records and we will be forced to use more recent death records.
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