Thursday, February 23, 2012
Those of you interested in Genealogy
may have seen some articles in the news lately, about the attempted posthumous
conversion of well known Holocaust victims such as Anne Frank and parents of
well known survivors such as Elie Wiesel.
This is a Mormon practice that troubles many. The LDS church officially promised to end the practice in 1995. In spite of that, there are still a few isolated cases of it happening against the church's stated policy.
As a genealogist who has benefited from the generous help of Mormon volunteers and from the work done by the LDS in rescuing and photocopying and digitizing many many records of Jews in Eastern Europe I find myself very conflicted.
There are millions of Mormons. I suppose the actions of a few extremists, in such a large group, can be understood as hard to prevent totally. According to what I've read, the Church approves it only if done by the descendants of the people being posthumously converted. These descendants then stand in as proxies in the conversion ceremony.
Anne Frank died as a teenager and never had descendants, so there can be no pretense of even following their own rules.
As a Holocaust survivor, and the family member of a number of Holocaust victims, I find the whole idea of "converting" people who were killed because of their religion repugnant. The concept of conversion by someone else's will also makes no sense to me at all.
I wish the LDS leadership would reconsider this practice, as some other past practices have been reconsidered in the past and then changed. I can't view it as anything less than disrespectful and offensive.
Friday, March 9, 2012
This is a Mormon practice that troubles many. The LDS church officially promised to end the practice in 1995. In spite of that, there are still a few isolated cases of it happening against the church's stated policy.
As a genealogist who has benefited from the generous help of Mormon volunteers and from the work done by the LDS in rescuing and photocopying and digitizing many many records of Jews in Eastern Europe I find myself very conflicted.
There are millions of Mormons. I suppose the actions of a few extremists, in such a large group, can be understood as hard to prevent totally. According to what I've read, the Church approves it only if done by the descendants of the people being posthumously converted. These descendants then stand in as proxies in the conversion ceremony.
Anne Frank died as a teenager and never had descendants, so there can be no pretense of even following their own rules.
As a Holocaust survivor, and the family member of a number of Holocaust victims, I find the whole idea of "converting" people who were killed because of their religion repugnant. The concept of conversion by someone else's will also makes no sense to me at all.
I wish the LDS leadership would reconsider this practice, as some other past practices have been reconsidered in the past and then changed. I can't view it as anything less than disrespectful and offensive.
Friday, March 9, 2012
I was pleased to see a Letter to the Editor from the Jewish
Relations Committee Southern California Public Affairs Council, Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints in the March 9-15 Jewish Journal from which I quote
as follows:
"...the LDS Church agrees that names of Jewish Holocaust victims should not be submitted for temple ordinances except by their direct descendants who have joined the church(a small group, to be sure). Just last Sunday, a letter signed by the top three leaders of the church was read to every Mormon congregation in the world. It reminded members of the policy on Holocaust name submissions, and listed possible sanctions that could be imposed on violators of the policy. There has never been more than a minyan of Mormons worldwide who choose to violate this rule: 99,999999 percent of the 14 million Mormons living in 167 countries across the world honor the memory of Jewish Holocaust victims in the way that our Jewish friends have asked of us..."
"...the LDS Church agrees that names of Jewish Holocaust victims should not be submitted for temple ordinances except by their direct descendants who have joined the church(a small group, to be sure). Just last Sunday, a letter signed by the top three leaders of the church was read to every Mormon congregation in the world. It reminded members of the policy on Holocaust name submissions, and listed possible sanctions that could be imposed on violators of the policy. There has never been more than a minyan of Mormons worldwide who choose to violate this rule: 99,999999 percent of the 14 million Mormons living in 167 countries across the world honor the memory of Jewish Holocaust victims in the way that our Jewish friends have asked of us..."
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