So what's the moral track record on LDS Church proclamations?
Mormons today hang a church proclamation in their homes. Yesterday in Sacrament Meeting most Bishops read a letter from the First Presidency remindng them to obey that proclamation.
Here's another church proclamation, just as serious and just as official as the one the church is now pushing on the membership.
This church proclamation came from the president of the church and was published in the Deseret News for all members to obey:
Church Proclamation to Women
“Now for my proposition; it is more particularly for my sisters, as it is frequently happening that women say they are unhappy. Men will say, 'My wife, though a most excellent woman, has not seen a happy day since I took my second wife,' 'No, not a happy day for a year,' says one; and another has not seen a happy day for five years."
"It is said that women are tied down and abused: that they are misused and have not the liberty they ought to have; that many of them are wading through a perfect flood of tears."
“I wish my own women to understand that what I am going to say is for them as well as others, and I want those who are here to tell their sisters, yes, all the women of this community, and then write it back to the States, and do as you please with it. I am going to give you from this time to the 6th day of October next, for reflection, that you may determine whether you wish to stay with your husbands or not, and then I am going to set every woman at liberty and say to them, Now go your way, my women with the rest, go your way."
"And my wives have to go and do one of two things; either round up their shoulders to endure the afflictions of this world, and live their religion, or they may leave, for I will not have them about me. I will go into heaven alone, rather than have scratching and fighting around me. I will set all at liberty. 'What, first wife too?' Yes, I will liberate all."
“I wish my women, and brother Kimball's and brother Grant's to leave, and every woman in this Territory, or else say in their hearts that they will embrace the Gospel –the whole of it."
"[Priesthood Men,] say to your wives, 'Take all that I have and be set at liberty; but if you stay with me you shall comply with the law of God, and that too without further murmuring and whining. You must fulfill the law of God in every respect, and round up your shoulders to walk up to the mark without any grunting.'"
"Now recollect that two weeks from to morrow I am going to set you at liberty. But the first wife will say, 'It is hard, for I have lived with my husband twenty years, or thirty, and have raised a family of children for him, and it is a great trial to me for him to have more women;' then I say it is time that you gave him up to other women who will bear children. If my wife had borne me all the children that she ever would bare, the celestial law would teach me to take young women that would have children."
“Sisters, I am not joking, I do not throw out my proposition to banter your feelings, to see whether you will leave your husbands, all or any of you. But I know that there is no cessation to the everlasting whining of many women in this territory; I am satisfied that this is the case. And if the women will turn from the commandments of God and continue to despise the order of heaven, I will pray that the curse of the Almighty may be close to their heals, and that it may be following them all the day long."
“Prepare yourselves for two weeks from to morrow; and I will tell you now, that if you will tarry with your husbands, after I have set you free, you must bow down to it, and submit yourselves to the Celestial Law. You may go where you please, after two weeks from to-morrow; but, remember, that I will not hear any more of this whining.”
- The First Presidency, President Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 4., pp. 55-57; also printed in Deseret News, Vol. 6, pp. 235-236
So you see, the church has a history of making demands and bullying people.
Do these "proclamations" deserve anyone's obedience?
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