A Thinking Man

Some things are just too remarkable to ignore.

I stumbled across a fact that had somehow managed to pass me by until just recently. As someone who used to be in the Christian camp, I thought I knew a fair bit about the Church of Jesus Christ and the Latter-day Saints (LDS), more commonly known as Mormons. When they came to my door (which they frequently did) I would often try to engage in the pointless task of trying to help them see the errors of their ways. I knew about the absurdity of the Book of Mormon (known for its plagiarism of the King James Bible - using Victorian English in what is supposed to be an American translation of an ancient, historical record - and the absence of archaeological and historical records supporting the book’s story, as well as an array of anachronisms). A few months ago I learned about their special underwear (don’t ask me how), but yesterday I discovered something that made even my hardened jaw drop.

Mormons regularly baptize dead people by proxy.

You see, it’s a gift. The reasoning goes something like this. Baptism enables the deceased to have the opportunity to accept the Mormon faith in an afterlife. So a main tenet of LDS Church doctrine is to baptize posthumously, by proxy, all who have died without an LDS baptism. Baptisms for the dead are performed in LDS temples worldwide. And in order to help the church do this, its members collect birth, death, christening, marriage and other related information of deceased people, from archives and registers of churches and denominations, when access is permitted.

A very, very superficial initial response to this would be to see it as a practice that harms nobody. After all, it isn’t as if those who are baptized on behalf of some distant dead relative or the LDS Church are making money out of it. It isn’t like the Medieval and modern (see A Strange Spirituality) Roman Catholic practice of issuing indulgences where believers could allegedly obtain exemption from all or part of the time in purgatory for themselves or for deceased people - a practice that vastly increased the church’s wealth.

Unfortunately very few things are that simple. Here are my objections to the practice:

• It is insensitive and potentially hurtful to the living. Suppose you are an ardent member of another religion and you know that throughout your life the deceased person in question shared your particular faith - that is, the were definitely not a Mormon. Then imagine your potential pain at discovering that the deceased person’s name was listed on a Mormon website (the IGI - the International Genealogy Index) as having been baptized a Mormon! It is easy to see how surviving non-Mormon relatives may feel that their deceased family have been ‘violated’.

• The practice is extremely disrespectful to the dead. Most of the dead were adults who made adult decisions about their faith and they decided not to become Mormons when they had the chance. The proxy baptism violates that choice. The IGI contains the names of former popes - doubtless they would be pleased to be on the list if they could speak. It also contains the names of many Jews who were killed during the holocaust. Imagine the contempt you would feel if, having died, partly because of your religion, you could look down after death and see others arrogantly deciding that you needed a different one. It would tend to make a mockery of your life choices.

• The practice could potentially jeopardize the free flow of information for genealogists. The Catholic Church has recently instructed its members to withhold information from Mormons in an attempt to discourage proxy baptism. An April 5 letter from the Vatican Congregation for Clergy directs all Catholic bishops “to keep the Latter-day Saints from microfilming and digitizing information contained” in parish registers. This ultra-controlling organisation that at one time tried to influence the afterlife of the dead in more pecuniary ways is threatening to cause disruption to researchers in this life because of another religion’s attempts to control the afterlife of the dead. Although I find that totally bizarre, the practical consequences could mean that life if more difficult for historians.

• In my view the practice seems to be encouraging people to waste time in what I call ‘magical, slot machine religion’ - you know, the kind where if you go on pulling the right levers (performing the right acts), you, or somebody else wins the prize. It is sad that on the basis of an obvious forgery (the Book of Mormon) people think that by being baptized they can alleviate a mythical afterlife on behalf of someone else. One cannot but help think that these people would be better off spending their time on more productive things. An increased focus on the living might be a better place to start.

I’ve thought about setting up a Jehovah’s Witnesses database and publishing it on the web, putting all the names of deceased Mormons that I can find on it claiming that I have performed a ceremony (sprinkled water, lit a candle, made a donation to Battersee Dogs’ Home) converting them to JWs. I suspect a few members of the LDS might object to that and try to sue me.

Tags: baptism, baptize, Church of Jesus Christ and the Latter-day Saints, dead, digitizing, genealogists, Holocaust, IGI genealogy, International Genealogy Index, Jews, LDS, microfilming, Mormons, proxy, Roman Catholics, Vatican