Not only is this practice creepy, but it shows Mitt Romney's cult has no shame:
It has been determined that Barack Obama’s mother, Ann Dunham, was baptized by the Mormon Church after her death. The baptism occurred five months before the 2008 presidential election.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints confirmed that the president’s mother was baptized into the Mormon faith, and it doesn’t appear that the president wanted this to happen. Dunham died in 1995 from cancer and after President Obama received enough delegate support to win the Democratic nomination for president, someone in the Mormon church improperly conducted the ceremony.
That it was "improperly conducted" should be the least of the offenses found here,...
Hitchens on Free Speech
ReplyDeleteThis whole baptism of the dead thing, was a way of getting people to become Mormon. They would say, if you convert all your dead relatives get a chance to convert with you. So you all could be together in heaven.
ReplyDeleteGreat.
So I am not sure how Barack Obama's mom (who was of course a member of that other cult known as Marxist socialism) got baptised. Was it some distant relative who added her to his list of relatives? Was it some member trying to engage in a little mischief by adding Ann Durham to his or her list?
Does it even matter?
Let me give you an example. When Derbyshire did that article on his "talk." I made the suggestion to a few over at Raw Story that none of them were harmed in any way by the speech of Derbyshire. They were free to challenge it, debate it, disagree with it, but the fact he said it did not cause harm. Hell, liberals do things far more offensive all the time and do not care if it moves their agenda along.
This whole baptism by proxy thing is the same thing. The proper response is it is a bunch of BS and if you want to go through the fiction of making some convert happy that he is going to see relatives he or she never met in heaven--well leave the rest of us out of it.
But it really does not cause harm. I am not outraged by it. It does not make anyone Mormon--even in their own theology the dead get the option of being Mormon (it is not forced on them).
There are far bigger things, like Egypt issuing arrest warrants for Americans over some youtube video to worry about. While the threat is remote (unless Terry Jones is planning that trip to the pyramids), it is a lot more tangible than some LDS baptism practice.
Part of my reason for posting it - just one - is to remind you this cult, who everyone calls good and wholesome and honest, lies about it's numbers and how those numbers are arrived at.
ReplyDeleteHow no one slams them, specifically, as liars - but volunteers evasive excuses for them instead - amazes me:
Scientology certainly isn't getting this treatment.
And finally:
So far, Mitt Romney,...has evaded most questions by acting as if he was being subjected to some kind of religious test for public office. He’s been supported in this by some soft-centered types who think that any dislike for any “faith group” is ipso facto proof of some sort of prejudice. Sorry, but this will not wash. I don’t think I would want to vote for a Scientologist or a Moonie for high office, or indeed any other kind, and I think attempts to silence criticism of such outfits are the real evidence of prejudice...
The Mormons apparently believe that Jesus will return in Missouri rather than Armageddon: I wouldn’t care to bet on the likelihood of either. In the meanwhile, though, we are fully entitled to ask Mitt Romney about the forces that influenced his political formation and—since he comes from a dynasty of his church, and spent much of his boyhood and manhood first as a missionary and then as a senior lay official—it is safe to assume that the influence is not small. Unless he is to succeed in his dreary plan to borrow from the playbook of his pain-in-the-ass predecessor Michael Dukakis, and make this an election about "competence not ideology," he should be asked to defend and explain himself, and his voluntary membership in one of the most egregious groups operating on American soil.
- Christopher Hitchens
Okay, maybe it is a bit weird...but it does involve cattle.
ReplyDeleteLDS is driven by births, not conversions.
EBL, the Mormon go through all sorts of genealogical data sites, pick out names, and just start dunking them. They have even gotten names from sites for genealogical study that non-Mormons use and which were created by Mormons.
ReplyDeleteNo relative is asked permission or even has knowledge of this.
I just found out a few weeks ago that my aunt, a devout Catholic her entire life, became a Mormon -- two years ago (she's been dead since '05). A person can try to stay logical about it, but to honest it's really quite irritating,like there is no privacy and respect of someone else's boundaries -- that's not granting other people freedom of speech in a sense, and then saying "oh well, didn't hurt them". That's BS!
I don't see how anyone can expect anyone else to not get mad at that.
(which kinda ties into Terry Jones -- free speech and all, but there are better and less stupid ways to criticize Islam; just because you can doesn't mean you should, or at least you shouldn't be so abjectly dumb and obnoxious when you do -- Hitch could really blast a religion, but he wasn't a dumbass when he did it, for example).
PW
Oh yes, because treating children like some sort of assembly line product to reach the goal of "x trillion souls saved" (and a burgers served!) is such a wonderful, wholesome thing -- along with treating their parents like breeder hogs.
ReplyDeleteThat's a really wonderful way of looking at people, human freaking beings. Hmmm, who else has done this....guess that means conservatives need to go to bat for them too? (and yeah, I'm not letting the religion of my heritage off the hook there...that whole "make more souls for the Lord, church, whatever, so get in there and start _____" is atrocious.
PW
You need to get on the do not baptize list.
ReplyDeleteWhy should a person have to go out of their way to do that, when the civil thing, the ethical thing to do is to just not do that without permission in the first place?
ReplyDeletePeople raise a big stink about bending over backwards for Muslims (which I heartily agree with -- its ridiculous that people have to walk on eggshells because of some groups' oh so tender feelings or whatever), but then go out of their way to make excuses for what is really just horribly rude behavior from those "nice, wholesome" Mormons?
It's rude, and people shouldn't have to go out of their way to keep from being the target of their rudeness -- and people who allow it while bitching about other groups are hypocrites! Now we have an entire political party that is engaging in this nonsense because of their stupid nominee (who is making a real balls of this election cycle). Ridiculous!
PW
and most fun of all: people are going to get called bigots and all manner of rude things for just pointing this simple truth out...ridiculous!
This is interesting. Thanks for sharing. This is a great post.
ReplyDelete