Baptisms For The Dead and Marriages For The Living
The LDS church is in the news again this week:
Holocaust survivors said Monday they are through trying to negotiate with the Mormon church over posthumous baptisms of Jews killed in Nazi concentration camps, saying the church has repeatedly violated a 13-year-old agreement barring the practice.
The question that I have is: why do they care? If you believe Judaism, then what the Mormons do in their little databases and in their temples is none of your concern. In fact, if I’m to remember my theology correctly, we are worm food after death according to the Jewish teachings. There is no afterlife in Judaic teaching, right? Am I wrong?
Why should they care whether people who are Jews are baptized in proxy in LDS temples? I don’t even know why the LDS church agreed to bar the practice. What right do Holocaust survivors (or anyone for that matter) have to tell the LDS church what they can and cannot do in their little imaginary world? They aren’t hurting anyone by dunking teenagers in water and checking names off lists, so this seems like a pretty clear cut case to me.
The LDS church’s involvement in Prop 8, on the other hand, is pretty damn infuriating…
I wish I had known about the protest here in Salt Lake. I would have been at the front of the lines.
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Comment by Brandon Lewis — 11/11/2008 @ 11:22 am
I actually think the Jewish people have a point. I could see being offended that someone was doing something against my wishes with (even the names of) my ancestors.
Perhaps the Holocaust survivors resent actions based on others’ faith because they have faith of their own.
Comment by Jane — 11/12/2008 @ 12:20 am
Then why not baptize dead Mormons into the Church of Satan? Or why wait? Baptize living Jews in absentia. And if they don’t like it, they can request to opt out.
Or why don’t we start the Aryan Race religion, with Hitler as the martyred prophet! We can begin baptizing the “supposed” holocaust victims into the Aryan religion as the servants of Hitler in the afterlife.
I think you can see how this idea quickly goes from innocuous to downright appalling pretty fast.
I mean, which religion would you feel comfortable having your grandparents posthumously converted to?
Comment by calvin — 11/24/2008 @ 12:44 am