D. Stussy wrote: > How is this a "REAL Baptism?" Are they digging up corpses? Probably not, since "real" baptisms can be done only by Jesus Christ or John the Baptist. > > From the religious point of view, don't they only have any "right" to do this > ONLY if the deceased was a Mormon? That's obscure. If the deceased was a Mormon, he'd already have been baptised into their faith; no point in re-doing it after he died. >Otherwise, I see this as religious > infringement upon the deceased which could easily be an offense against > the descendants of that deceased. Umm, if the dead have rights, we're in big trouble. So, if they have no rights to be infringed upon, the descendants have no logical reason to complain that the rights of deceased were violated. I've got relatives who are offended when I attend a church service not of my own denomination. I try not to let them worry me. > > I don't have a problem with SOME group keeping the records. However, when I > was at one of their FHL's a year ago, it bothered me when the staffer kept > referring to ancestral records as "blessings." I am not a Mormon. Clearly, you're not. Nor am I. However, a "Blessing" is an entirely different do-dad; as I understand it, they only apply to infants born to Mormon couples. It is the rite which is also known as a Christening or a Dedication. Perhaps the staffer was using the word in the "Blessings of Liberty" sense? But, as I said to someone else recently -- if one disapproves of the Mormons and their reasons for collecting and disseminating the data, perhaps one should exercise one's own ethics by refraining from using that data and their facilities. Cheryl my apologies to the French group -- I didn't see the name until now.

In article <3C8E2422.6E447AF1@erols.com> singhals@erols.com writes: >D. Stussy wrote: >> I don't have a problem with SOME group keeping the records. However, when I >> was at one of their FHL's a year ago, it bothered me when the staffer kept >> referring to ancestral records as "blessings." I am not a Mormon. > >Clearly, you're not. Nor am I. However, a "Blessing" is an >entirely different do-dad; as I understand it, they only apply to >infants born to Mormon couples. It is the rite which is also >known as a Christening or a Dedication. Perhaps the staffer was >using the word in the "Blessings of Liberty" sense? There is a view within the LDS culture that doing genealogy work enables the effort to get the temple work done and *that* is a "blessing upon" the genealogist. Essentially, genealogy is at the top of the list of Good Deeds. That may be what was being heard. There are a few other uses of the word that come to mind, but none that wound have records kept. Blessing and naming of infants is pretty much a local matter. I don't think there are records of those as such. It goes on LDS membership records, but I don't think it goes into the IGI, as it isn't a doctrinally required ordinance. (Pretty much the same as christening in some churches.) -- Drew Lawson I had planned to be dead by now, but drew@furrfu.com the schedule slipped, they do that. -- Casady

> But, as I said to someone else recently -- if one disapproves of > the Mormons and their reasons for collecting and disseminating > the data, perhaps one should exercise one's own ethics by > refraining from using that data and their facilities. Most people are probably not going to view this as a black & white issue. The Mormons have done us all a great service by collecting and disseminating these records. We owe them a debt of gratitude. If all they did was baptize non-Mormons by proxy, it wouldn't be much of a bone of contention. But, if I correctly understood the initial poster, they are going beyond that and are actually adding the names to their membership rolls. I have heard that Mormons have baptized many famous persons, including Albert Einstein and all deceased US presidents. I can see where families of these individuals would be upset by this apparent intrusion by an outside religious group--especially in cases where the deceased was active in another denomination during his/her lifetime. It doesn't help matters any by the fact that, among a significant number of non-Mormons, the LDS Church is viewed as a cult. What is paradoxical is that the Mormons I know are all decent persons and are not the type that would be expected to try to antagonize anyone. Perhaps someone of the Mormon faith can give us additional insight on their position on posthumous baptism. Clearly it is a matter of great importance to them.

In article <pptj8.14860$Vx1.1224900@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net> "Larry Y." <nospam@nospam.net> writes: >> But, as I said to someone else recently -- if one disapproves of >> the Mormons and their reasons for collecting and disseminating >> the data, perhaps one should exercise one's own ethics by >> refraining from using that data and their facilities. > >Most people are probably not going to view this as a black & white issue. >The Mormons have done us all a great service by collecting and disseminating >these records. We owe them a debt of gratitude. > >If all they did was baptize non-Mormons by proxy, it wouldn't be much of a >bone of contention. But, if I correctly understood the initial poster, they >are going beyond that and are actually adding the names to their membership >rolls. I didn't see anything posted about "membership rolls." The original poster looked at data which has been extracted from LDS temple records and, apparently, is offended that the information is labeled as being from temple records. He/She has inferred that this is a claim that there were no records involved predating the temple records. -- Drew Lawson I had planned to be dead by now, but drew@furrfu.com the schedule slipped, they do that. -- Casady