Holocaust survivors to Mormons: Stop baptisms of dead Jews

[Eponine]

[quote name='Yagathai' post='1585169' date='Nov 11 2008, 14.04']But that's crazy. It's like saying that my Yeoman Rand / Dr. McCoy slashfic is tremendously disrespectful to the memory of DeForrest Kelly. It just doesn't compute. What does [i]God[/i]... need with a starship?[/quote]

Would you be upset if someone dug up your deceased relatives and hacked open their bodies? I mean, they're dead, right, it doesn't affect them.

You don't have to be directly hurting someone living to be disrespectful.




I was christened as a baby Presbyterian, baptized as a grade school evangelical, and my parents wanted me to get baptized AGAIN when I told them that I hadn't believed as a child. (At that point they didn't know that I wasn't about to start believing).

[Lany Freelove Cassandra]

[quote name='Yagathai' post='1585149' date='Nov 11 2008, 13.50']However, as a Wiccan, your periods will strictly rationed.[/quote]
I wish my periods were more limited. :P (soon is not soon enough)

[Ser Bryon]

[quote name='Yagathai' post='1585145' date='Nov 11 2008, 13.48']To put it more simply: Let's say I believe that GI Joe could beat up Transformers, and you think otherwise. It's one thing if I come into your house and stomp on your toys, but if I'm in my room having Snakeyes teabagging Optimus Prime, who cares?[/quote]

I personally could care less what a person believes, as long as they don't try to cram it down my throat. As in the example you gave, as long as you keep your beliefs to yourself and you don't go go stomping on someone else's toys, it's all good. The problem here is that the Mormons are stomping on the faith of those Jewish people who have died. They are also stepping on the faith of the loved ones they left behind.

[quote name='Nous' post='1585157' date='Nov 11 2008, 13.55']These people are dead. It makes no difference at all to them if Mormons want to perform their some strange rites using their names and consider them Mormons afterwards. Dead people don't care. That living people actually [i]do[/i] care about what [i]Mormons[/i] think of posthumous religious denomination of the dead just goes to show that in some ways dying can make you more sensible.[/quote]

Very true, as long as we accept that the dead have no idea what is going on (which is a probability). Just like most funerals (and most posthumous baptisms, apparently) this discussion and outrage is for the living.

[Teri]

[quote name='Pax Thien Jolie-Pitt' post='1585168' date='Nov 11 2008, 12.04']As credit for the misguided efforts of the Mormons ..................... at least they're trying to save everyone, which is more inclusive than Judaism.[/quote]

What?? Where do you get that from?

Judaism doesn't even [i]have[/i] a concept of people being "saved". Most branches of it say nothing about an afterlife of any form at all, and those that do, don't claim that being Jewish gives you any better ticket to it than Gentiles have.

[Bellis]

Wow. I'm actually with Yags and Nous on this one. Can't gather much outrage. It's disrespectful, but no more so than any other religious belief. As long as no secular authority is re-writing history as the Jewish holocaust into the Mormon holocaust, I don't think it matters what religion Mormons believe that the dead Jews are now, in the afterlife, 60 years after they died.

Do they deny that these people were Jews when they died? Isn't that the important thing, in terms of secular history?

[Yagathai]

[quote name='TerraPrime' post='1585186' date='Nov 11 2008, 14.13']Yags:

The issue of consent is irrelevant to you? If Mormons snare little kids from their Temple on Sabbath and forcibly convert them, would your argument that it's just one fantasy encroaching upon another still work? Why or why not?[/quote]

Kidnapping is kidnapping, regardless of the motive. There is a victim in kidnapping. There is no victim if I chant some meaningless words and sprinkle some water on my head and say that your grandmother's soul is now in heaven.

[quote name='Beam me up Ser Scotty']I'm not saying that the "conversion" will have any real effect. I'm saying the attempt to convert the dead is very disrepectful because it ignores the beliefs of those who died.[/quote]

But... you don't believe in the beliefs of those that died either. So what's the material difference here?

[quote name='Eponine']Would you be upset if someone dug up your deceased relatives and hacked open their bodies? I mean, they're dead, right, it doesn't affect them.[/quote]

That involves a destruction of property (yes, I know that legally corpses aren't actually property, but it's close enough in this context to work). It involves an actual physical act that causes damage to an actual physical thing. Plus, I paid to have those corpses embalmed and buried!

You can stand next to the grave and chant all you want. I don't care.

[Yagathai]

[quote name='Ser Bryon' post='1585200' date='Nov 11 2008, 14.20']I personally could care less what a person believes, as long as they don't try to cram it down my throat. As in the example you gave, as long as you keep your beliefs to yourself and you don't go go stomping on someone else's toys, it's all good. The problem here is that the Mormons are stomping on the faith of those Jewish people who have died. They are also stepping on the faith of the loved ones they left behind.[/quote]

Well, no. They're just... saying things. Meaningless things. Things which, if you're Jewish, you [i]by definition[/i] believe to be false.

[Pebble thats Stubby]

Look I just want to say.

If heaven is full of Mormons, then I'm gonna be mighty pissed off if because they "baptise" me after my death I'm sucked out of "hell" where the more interersting and fun people are and have to live in this Mormon heaven.


Course it may get better over time as gradually more normal people are baptised after death. I have this vision of a having to live in a strick Mormon society (hevean) that is gradually changed and converted with all the non-mormon influx. there would be religous war in heaven and Hell would be a peaceful place.

[Teri]

[quote name='Bellis' post='1585205' date='Nov 11 2008, 12.21']Wow. I'm actually with Yags and Nous on this one. Can't gather much outrage. It's disrespectful, but no more so than any other religious belief.[/quote]

It appears that Yags and Nous agree that the LDS practice is disrespectful to the living descendants of Holocaust victims, while Ser Scot and TerraPrime agree that the posthumous baptisms have no real effect on the dead.

This discussion seems to be mostly a matter of temperament, about how much indignation one tends to feel about matters of showing disrespect for the sensibilities of others.

[Lany Freelove Cassandra]

[quote name='Pebble that Hides' post='1585221' date='Nov 11 2008, 14.36']Look I just want to say.

If heaven is full of Mormons, then I'm gonna be mighty pissed off if because they "baptise" me after my death I'm sucked out of "hell" where the more interersting and fun people are and have to live in this Mormon heaven.


Course it may get better over time as gradually more normal people are baptised after death. I have this vision of a having to live in a strick Mormon society (hevean) that is gradually changed and converted with all the non-mormon influx. there would be religous war in heaven and Hell would be a peaceful place.[/quote]


Don't worry dear. Being a woman, your man would need to call you to him first. That's right, no matter how righteous of a life a woman has lived, it is up to her man to call her to his side in heaven.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Yagathai,

[quote]But... you don't believe in the beliefs of those that died either. So what's the material difference here?[/quote]

What I believe doesn't matter what matters is the person upon whom the "baptism" is confered will never be able to reject the alleged "baptism" because they are dead and can't (and will never be able to) speak for themselves.

[Mlle. Zabzie]

I personally think that it is disrespectful and insensitive towards the living (and not the dead, who, after all, don't care, being dead and all). On the other hand, many religions are pretty disrepectful of all but their own co-religionaries. Personally, I also think that making a big stink over this validates and legitimizes the process that the Mormons are engaging in, but I'm not what I'd call particularly religious. :dunno:

[Yagathai]

[quote name='Ser Scot A Ellison' post='1585226' date='Nov 11 2008, 14.38']Yagathai,
What I believe doesn't matter what matters is the person upon whom the "baptism" is confered will never be able to reject the alleged "baptism" because they are dead and can't (and will never be able to) speak for themselves.[/quote]

And? So?

I hereby certify that your great-grandfather was a space alien.

[Teri]

[quote name='Pebble that Hides' post='1585221' date='Nov 11 2008, 12.36']Look I just want to say.

If heaven is full of Mormons, then I'm gonna be mighty pissed off if because they "baptise" me after my death I'm sucked out of "hell" where the more interersting and fun people are and have to live in this Mormon heaven.[/quote]

Don't worry, Pebs, the Mormon teaching is that the soul of someone baptized posthumously gets the opportunity to say whether or not they accept the baptism.

So even if they do baptize you posthumously, you can still just say "screw off, I like it better here with the fun crowd."

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Yagathai,

[quote name='Yagathai' post='1585231' date='Nov 11 2008, 14.40']And? So?

I hereby certify that your great-grandfather was a space alien.[/quote]

So, your representation is assholish because my Grandfather can't refute your accusation. You're kicking people while they are, quite literally, down.

[Yagathai]

[quote name='Ser Scot A Ellison' post='1585237' date='Nov 11 2008, 14.43']Yagathai,

So, your representation is assholish because my Grandfather can't refute your accusation. You're kicking people while they are, quite literally, down.[/quote]

:rolleyes: Let me know when my irrational beliefs about your great-grandfather have any impact on your life whatsoever.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Yagathai,

If you want to be a shithead, be my guest. But I'm not going to say being a shithead is okay. I'm not going to stop you, but I will say you are behaving like a shithead. Mormons who "baptize" non-Mormons after death are behaving like shitheads.

[Teri]

[quote name='Ser Scot A Ellison' post='1585226' date='Nov 11 2008, 12.38']... what matters is the person upon whom the "baptism" is confered will never be able to reject the alleged "baptism" because they are dead and can't (and will never be able to) speak for themselves.[/quote]

Well, the Mormons [i]do[/i] teach that the dead can reject their baptism. (Personally I don't believe in any form of life after death, so from my point of view there is nothing to be doing the rejecting.)

What I think we will all agree on is that they can't reject it in any forum in which the living will be audience to that rejection.

[Ormond]

This isn't just an LDS practice in regards to baptism. They also do this in regard to [i]marriage[/i]. While doing my own geneology I found out over 20 years ago that a set of my great-great-grandparents had been "married by proxy" in a Mormon temple. I am fairly sure that particular couple have no descendants who are Mormons.

The theology behind this is that both baptism and marriage are only valid if they are performed in a Mormon service on this earth. Therefore for the baptisms and marriages of anyone who has died without converting to Mormonism to be valid, some Mormon has to be baptized or married by proxy for them.

Mormons don't see this as being an outrage, because of course in their minds once you are dead and in heaven, you will of course find out that the Mormon religion is the correct one, and so only people who are really evil and perverse will at that point NOT want to have their baptisms and marriages sealed in Mormon temples. They think they are doing the deceased a favor.

In terms of Jews -- it isn't just Holocaust victims that they are doing this for. I'm sure that thousands of Jews who died way before the Holocaust have been proxy baptized and married in Mormon temples, just as probably millions by now of people who died way before Joseph Smith was born have had the same "services" performed for them.

I can understand the outrage felt by some Jews. I remember being very shocked and angry when I found out that my ancestors William and Maria Caldwell had been "married" as Mormons posthumously. It feels like they have stolen my ancestors from me. But given LDS theology, they are very unlikely to see this as being offensive in the way that many non-Mormons do, and it's not something they are likely to stop any time soon.

[Yagathai]

[quote name='Ser Scot A Ellison' post='1585242' date='Nov 11 2008, 14.47']Yagathai,

If you want to be a shithead, be my guest. But I'm not going to say being a shithead is okay. I'm not going to stop you, but I will say you are behaving like a shithead. Mormons who "baptize" non-Mormons after death are behaving like shitheads.[/quote]

Dude, being a shithead is egging your car or going into your home and making lewd comments about your wife or voting yes on Prop 8. Making up things about your ancestors in the privacy of my own home or business is not being a shithead. It's weird, but if it offends you, I submit that it's you that has the problem and not me.