Tag Archives: Sally Denton

Guest Blog by Jane Freese: Dare to Examine Romney’s Mormonism

At the Las Vegas Book Festival (Nov. 2), Sally Denton, author of American Massacre and Faith and Betrayal said that she was puzzled by the lack of scrutiny about Mitt Romney’s Mormonism

Like Denton, I am a woman of Mormon ancestry, and I too am troubled by this lack of religious scrutiny. Being a Mormon is not the same as being a Presbyterian or a Methodist.  Being a Mormon is closer to being a Scientologist.  Anyone who has been a Mormon knows that being Mormon is integral to one’s character and belief system. As a Mormon friend of mine said, being a Mormon is “who you are.” It is not a religion.  It is a cult.

 He is Better Than You

To put it bluntly, Mitt Romney is not one of us.  I would not be surprised if Mitt has never tasted a beer, coffee, Coca-Cola, said a swear word, or had sex with any woman other than Ann outside of the marital bedroom. Is this an indictment? Not necessarily, but it does tell us that he cannot relate to the non-Mormon population without feeling self-righteous and superior.  To Mormons, all non-Mormons are “Gentiles.”

As a young man, Mitt participated in a rally supporting the draft, yet he was excused from it because he went on a religious mission to France.  That’s right, France. I have no problem with him avoiding the draft (who wants to go to war?), but to demonstrate in favor of the draft for others who might go to their deaths when you know you will not be put in that position is cruel and disgusting  Apparently, standard rules don’t apply to Mormon elders or the sons of governors.

Mitt has always known he was better than others. This knowledge gives him license to behave badly.  When he was in high school, a classmate’s flamboyant haircut offended his masculine sensibilities so much he recruited his posse of fellow gay bashers to assist him in a physical assault on the boy, tackling him to the floor and cutting off his blond locks with scissors, terrifying and humiliating him in the process. There were no repercussions.  Mitt claims to have no memory of the “hijinks,” but I do not believe him.  The young man came out as gay years later, but Mitt claims that people “didn’t think in those terms back then.”  Bull shit.  Homosexuality is a sin in the Mormon faith, one that invites excommunication. In other words, it will send the gay person straight to Hell. The defeat of Prop. 8 (marriage equality) was largely due to the millions of dollars the Mormon Church invested in its defeat.  Good work, bigots.

How many French people did Mitt convert to the faith?  There is no clear answer.  For a numbers guy, he cannot definitively take credit for a single conversion.  Apparently the French are not keen on abstention from wine, sex, colorful language, and the pleasures of being a little naughty from time to time. Good for them. But Mormon missionary work is not really about converting non-believers as much as it is about indoctrinating the missionaries themselves; the future patriarchy of the church.

Mormons are constantly told and encouraged to declare as part of their testimony that they belong to the “true church.” Other religions are not simply misguided. According to the church’s founder, Joseph Smith, God considers other faiths to be an “abomination.” Pretty strong word, wouldn’t you say? Abomination.

Prepare for the Apocalypse

Mormons stockpile food and water for the upcoming Apocalypse.  According to Mormon belief, Mormons will be notified first of a coming disaster through the church hierarchy. It isn’t enough to be a Latter-day Saint to qualify for the “run to your bomb shelter” phone call. You have to be on the bishop’s “Mormon in good standing” speed-dial.  The rest of the population, the Gentiles, will be doomed to extinction.  Poor bastards. They should have put down their Starbucks and listened to the missionaries who had only their best interests at heart.

Do we really want a president who believes that the end of the world is likely, soon?  Push the button, Mr. President; after all it is God’s will. Wouldn’t want all those cans of evaporated milk to go to waste now would we?  It’s all good.  Heavenly Father is purging the Earth for the Second Coming of Jesus.

Not only do Mitt Romney and other Mormons believe that they will be assigned to rebuild the Earth, they will be gods of their own worlds in the hereafter.  Sorry women, only males will be gods.  Females cannot gain entry into the penthouse of heaven (the Celestial Kingdom) on their own, they must be escorted “though the veil.” Without a priesthood holder (man) to escort them into the Celestial Kingdom, she will be relegated to the lower levels, doomed to dwell for eternity with the dreaded Gentiles.

The Celestial Kingdom is for Mormons

Other than Mormons, I can think of no other religion besides Muslims that envision the afterlife more concretely with their lakes of fire and harems of virgins. All is to be sacrificed for the ultimate reward—Heaven.  Romney knew that focusing as much as possible on “the Creator” in his closing statements at the debates he would win the hearts of Christians.  What they don’t know is that Mormons don’t consider other Christians equal to Mormons. Mormons believe themselves to be closer to Jews than to Christians.  The Hebrew Bible states that Jews are “the chosen.”  The Book of Mormon states that the Latter-day Saints are “the chosen.” How lovely it is to be a little bit better than everybody else.

If you are raised in a Mormon family, this fabulous position is yours, and just as the Jews were persecuted, so were Mormons.  The Mormons were driven into the desert to establish a promised land—Zion. I was raised hearing great tales or deprivation, sacrifice, pioneer heroics, and miracles. There is no doubt that the Mormons did astounding things with very little resources.  There is nothing quite like religious zeal with its promise of celestial reward or eternal hell fire to stimulate construction and agriculture.

How this applies to Mitt Romney is simple.  As a former Mormon from a long line of Mormon pioneers I know that there is a sense of obligation to the sacrifices made by our ancestors. Like Romney, I too, am a descendant of Mormon polygamist Mexican expatriates.  When the federal government outlawed polygamy many families decided to flee the laws of this country and settle in Mexico.  Although polygamy was against Mexican law, President Diaz turned a blind eye to the domestic practices of the Mormon colonists in exchange for the commercial enhancement that Mormons brought to a desolate area.

Whites Only

I must point out that the Mormons colonists, although friendly with their Mexican neighbors, never integrated.  They still celebrated the Fourth of July and flew American flags.  According to the Book of Mormon, dark skinned people are Lamanites.  The light skinned people, the Nephites, were good and dark skinned people were inferior.

I was taught, as a child, that the reason blacks could not hold the Mormon priesthood was that Africans, and therefore African American blacks, were marked by Cain’s ancient curse for killing his brother Abel and lying to God.

How can people living thousands of years after an event (if you believe it ever happened at all) be blamed for it?  Here is another dimension of the Mormon religion that few know about.  Mormons believe that our souls exist before we are born and that we are assigned a family to be raised by.  So, souls assigned a Mormon home are just a tiny bit better than those who are not. Souls assigned an African American family (mark of Cain) must have done something to deserve it. How any person of color can be a Mormon is beyond my understanding.

Although Mormons pride themselves for being early abolitionists, they didn’t believe that black people were their equals. God apparently changed his mind in 1978.  Now African Americans can hold the Mormon priesthood. Oh goodie!

 “You People”

I was also taught that wealth is endorsed by God.  My grandparents worked hard to establish a successful mink business. They amassed a small fortune.  They made it clear and it is dangerous to let others know how much money you have because they will try to take it away from you.  Romney’s refusal to reveal his tax returns reminds me of this paranoia.  In an interview, Ann Romney was asked about their refusal to divulge more than two years of income tax returns.  She used the phrase, “you people.”  As in “you people don’t need to know.” “You people” indeed.

I’ve worked for the Obama campaign. I hope he wins.  However, there is another part of me that knows that if Romney wins his presidency and he is unsuccessful in fulfilling his excessive promises it could be detrimental to the Mormon cause.  The great Mormon patriarch, bully boss, High Priest and god in the making, could bring about the downfall of the middleclass.  Mormonism is the religion of misogyny, racism, self-righteousness, and oppression.

Political correctness cripples free speech and an honest examination of ideas and beliefs. Saying that Mitt Romney has contempt for 47% of the population is generous.  If only about 2% of the US population is Mormon, then I would assert that he has contempt, or at least pity, for 98%.  He said he cares about 100% of us.  I seriously doubt it.

 

Pastiche and that Mormon Thing

Since my last blog I’ve been preoccupied with editing This Mobius Strip of Ifs, which is a mixture of essays and memoirs on education, Existentialism, writing, family, movies, death, living, separation, attachment and psychological abandonment as  well as societal conditioning. Whew! After pretty well “scrubbing” the text, Jane and I still found about 50 corrections to make, some requiring re-phrasing, others making the text more felicitous. All tedious and necessary. It is a sturdy book; if better than that, I leave it to reviewers. I have sent out a copy to a contest as well as other work as well. I am a believer in contests, all so Darwinian. Concomitant with all this, I’ve made lists of literary bloggers and have posted queries to about 150 sites and I expect to get a small sampling back. You just have to keep scouring directories, Yahoo, New Pages, etc for sites that suit your genre, in this case memoir/essay. Although not a joiner, I did sign up at bookblogs.ning.com which deals with all kinds of variations, including non-fiction work.

While all this is going on my next book is at the starting gate, “I Truly Lament,” a collection of short stories on various aspects of the Holocaust, a follow up to The i Tetralogy.” It has been edited very well, quite spiffy, and except for a few final touches it will go out to a major contest within a week or so as a word document or PDF, as some reviewers are willing to do that — the writing world is changing as I write. I will coddle this book, hopefully acquiring a publisher rather than self-publishing. It has stainless steel balls, for 10 stories have been published in 2010-2011 from the collection. As usual I go out on the limb in this book.

I lurch daily from editing, seeking out bloggers for possible reviews, making lists of potential things to do to push the book, worrying about deadlines for this and that and squeaking in here and there a book to read, which in this case is American Massacre by Sally Denton, the sordid tale of the Mountain Meadows Massacre committed by the theocratic state of the Mormons. Let me be clear here: it was the most significant atrocity ever committed on American soil until the bombing by Mcvey in Oklahoma. I have read at least three able books about the Mormons, one on the massacre itself and it wasn’t until I read Denton’s work that I got a more complete understanding of what had happened. A previous blog on Fanny Stenhouse will bring  you up up to date, for I’d rather give my emotional response to what I read without giving all the details — that is your task if interested.

Observations: Brigham Young was a crypto-fascist, wrong word to use, but in all aspects he was; he did not collude in the massacre of an emigrant wagon train of settlers from Arkansas. He was directly responsible as much as Hitler was responsible for Dachau. One does not have to turn on the gas to be responsible for the act. The Mormon “church,” if that is what it is, has spent over a century in a cover up, in one fashion or another for the killing of at least 140 men and women, the rape of one girl if not two by R. D. Lee, the enrapt and obeisant follower of Young. What I am about to say is the crux of it all. The mental conditioning, the cult-like behavior within the church’s own doctrines and the theocracy which ruled Utah  was so despotic and corrosively and psychologically invasive of its people it led to the classic “in” group versus the “out” group, in this case Mormons versus the Federal government. When you read about this group you sense that it is like reading about Jim Jones, except in this instance, the Mormons externalized their rage and fears on an innocent group. I conclude it is a church of followers; consequently I doubt in the forseeable future any great art emanating from this insular group.

I am at the point when I was first learned about the Holocaust — appalled, enraged, furious, angered, hateful, disgusted, seeking some punishment for the perpetrators. Until very recently the Mormons stonewalled any efforts to reveal the total truth, these so-called people of the book. The worst hypocrites are religious people, for they are ruled and dominated by a doctrine and they are in no way free of their conditioning. They revel in their blindness. When unearthing fragments of bones, skulls, and the like, archaeologists were pressured by the Mormon church to cease and desist, an old tradition in that church; the scientists were furious and rightfully so, for their preliminary results pointed directly at white men and not Indians responsible for the killing. In short, historically the church has taken miniscule steps to allow true inquiry into its role in that massacre. And historically, like all good white men of the day, they blamed the local Indians for the deed, although in fact Mormon men dressed and painted up as the Indians controlled and carried out the act, and that act was deliberately carried out through a chain of command going back directly to Brigham Young who used what we would today call, “plausible deniability.” Corrupt, venal, cut-throat, base, coarse, rude and vulgar, he wrapped himself in the relgious cloak of infallibility and let his henchmen take the rap. Years later after two trials only one man, R.D. Lee, was executed. By the way, the U. S. government did collude in not pursuing the case for all kinds of political reasons. A few very honorable human beings did protest, crypto-Schindlers. Ah, the repetition compulsion of the human race.

Like the Nazis, who collected the luggage, shoes, hair and gold teeth from their victims at the extermination camps, after the massacre wagons were loaded up with the dresses of the slain women, their earrings, personal items, their shoes, undergarments, and the clothing of the men as well as the stock they had driven from Arkansas, their wagons — the bodies were left stripped and nude and observers saw wolves feasting on their carcasses for weeks after.  In short, all the paraphernalia was collected and driven back to Salt Lake City in wagons where women were employed to wash out the blood from the garments, press and iron them.  I associated to how the Germans cleansed human hair and  wove them  into blankets for their troops on the eastern front. The few very young children who were eight or younger were allowed to live because of some decrepit Mormon doctrine and often assigned to the homes of the very slayers of their parents!The personal trauma was astounding, haunting them for the rest of their lives and their descendants as well. In one grotesque and horrific incident, R. D. Lee heard his young “adopted” girl see his wife and say that it was the dress her mother had and so were the earrings; with that Lee got up and cut her throat. So she was psychologically killed once and now he killed her forever. I give you one of the high officers of the church.

Denton writes in a measured voice, for she is an investigative journalist; it all sneaked up on me, the culminatively arraying of facts so that conclusions are more powerful because they are not driven home. I’m at that point that I am ready to debate any Mormon I find in Nevada about the hideousness of his past, for I do believe that we all have to metabolize our personal and collective pasts if we are to move ahead in some way toward a better life or existence. The Mormons, I believe, are a frozen collective, and in many aspects are a cult much like Scientology. It is brain control of a significant kind. Jane is not a “Jack Mormon,” which according to a definition is a Mormon who does not follow the church but has a measure of devotion to it. Jane is an apostate, thank “god,”a tried and blue atheist and she sees through her Mormon upbringing with a laser eye. I will only say, perennial shrink that I am, here and there, like a stone on the road I catch Jane’s conditioning , which I point out to her. It often takes the shape of obeisance. And sometimes with love and sometimes with anger, I go after that, for I detest enslavement of any kind, especially mind conrol from a church.

Only recently Jane received a call from a Mormon elder asking if she was interested in…You can fill it in. Jane thought about it and said no. She informedme that they never let go, or stop trying. In any case I think to test her mettle she thought it might be very interesting if she invited the elder back to discuss her reentry into the church. I questioned her about her motives, but she wanted this and saw through to herself. In any case two men arrived, one older than the other, dressed in black, and I was informed by Jane they come in twos. After two hours with them, I returned home because she had requested I leave, knowing that I would have gone at them fast and furious about other things. What had happened? The same old crap, but this time she argued evolution and gave them her considerable knowledge about this and that and as she told me this her eyes rolled up because it was all so useless. I could have saved her the time. When you are a zombie, aspirin doesn’t help and sweet reason does not stay the hand at the oven’s door. A few days letter a note on yellow foolscap, folded in four, was at my doorstep, addressed to Sister Holt, her maiden name, asking her if she would like to attend the next church meeting, etc. Note that Jane tells the story while in a temple in Utah she asked one of the tour guides what was her first name as they were addressing one another as sister. Jane was told this was natural and normal; however, when asked what was the first name of her companion guide, she could not(!) give it because she did not know it. I give you a slave.

Probably the most hated, the most loathed symbol to a Mormon is the question mark.

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