Mormons can keep a secret.

I'm preparing a talk for a baptism on Saturday. The preparation is going fine but I started to realized that when it comes to discussing the church with new members I tend to self edit my comments. The first time it happened was about two years ago talking with a new member about why people disliked Mormons so much. I started to give some examples and I brought up the pre-civil war Republican party platform that was basically anti-Mormon. "End the twin relics of barbarism" was the slogan I wanted to make the point that I isn't as bad as it used to be. But I stopped short of telling him that one of the relics was polygamy (the other was slavery). I don't know why. In retrospect I missed out on an opportunity to explain it in a way that would not shock him or hurt his faith.

As I write this talk, I wonder if I am doing the same. I know my audience will be one new convert, several ward members, and possibly her non-member friends and relatives. So I don't want to go overboard (like I am known for doing in Gospel Doctrine). I will edit out much of what I wrote in the first draft. But I also don't want to self edit for the wrong reasons.

On a related note, the other day my wife was on a business appointment and noticed my Book of Mormon teaching manual and Teaching of Joseph Smith were in the car where her client would see them. Being in "The South" and not knowing how her client would react, she started to hide them. He business partner, who is Methodist, stopped her. "You have nothing to be be ashamed of", she told her. "You practice your religion and people will respect that even if they don't agree with you." I could only think "You have no idea how wrong you are."

Do Mormons keep quiet about their history? Or at least parts of their history that they think others won't understand? Do we hide our being Mormon if we think it will hurt us? I've said it before. We are paranoid. But is that the right way to react? As I write this talk I can't help but think that I would rather be disliked for what I really believe than for what other think I believe. Has the world changed enough to accept us for who we are? I wonder.

Stakes & Wards in Nauvoo

I read this article on how the priesthood was organized during the Nauvoo period. It was really kind of cool. You can see elements of how things are done today in the problem experienced in how they were done then.

For example, the Aaronic priesthood quorums would have problems with member frequently being advanced to other quorums, sometimes with such frequency that the only person left would be the president. After the Temple was dedicated the problem became worse as missionaries were required to have their endowments and therefore be ordained to the Melchizedek Priesthood. Most Priesthood holders were Seventies and very few were Deacons, Teachers or Priests. Calling younger men to fill this role appears to be a natural next step.

There is much more in the article, which I highly recommend.

Shakers & Mormons

Part of the same religious experience that shook the 19th century, Mormons continue to have a fascination with Shakers. The reverse might be true, but since I recently heard there are only three shakers left (in Sabbathday Lake, Maine) I'm not sure they think about us at all.
D&C 49 describes a missionary call to the Shakers. I won't fill up the space here with details you can read on your own. But I will say I spent the 15th of September at a South Union KY, a former Shaker community now turned into a museum. Though not exactly Mormon History, the events surrounding the various Shaker communities strike a familiar chord. Aspects of early Mormonism that I find interesting are present in the Shaker faith. Other posts elsewhere recently have touched on this too. I found an historic one here and a modern connection here. Even separated by over a century, Mormons find the attraction compelling.

Just pick another date

I don't live in Zion. Now, don't go assuming that I'm trying to make some kind of judgement about Deseret and the wisdom of living there. My parents grew up in Salt Lake and I have many relatives who live there now. I'm just trying the state a fact. I don't live there. Outside of my stint at BYU and the MTC, I have never lived there. I live just outside Nashville, and sometimes it is obvious how far away I am. Pioneer day was a blip on the radar screen. I actually got complements after speaking on Pioneer Day Sunday because I spoke about, wait for it, the Pioneers! And our ward did have a pioneer day celebration...on Labor day. And while I'm at it, the Aaronic Priesthood commemorative father & son camp out is being held in two weeks, (September 19-20). The date was picked because it always rains in May in Nashville. I'm sure the pioneer picnic celebration was moved for a comparable reason.

I can't help but think of a little skit we would do at boy scout camp. A man walks on to stage looking very carefully on the ground for something. Another man walks on from the other direction and asks the first what he is doing. The first replies that he is looking for his wallet. The second man agrees to help him look. They are soon joined by another person who also agrees to assist. Others join and the first man is called upon to describe the wallet, its contents, and how long it has been missing. Finally another joins the search and asks, "Where did you lose it?" to which he says, "in the woods down by the lake." Everyone stops looking as the newcomer asks the next logical question "Then why are we looking here?" "well," explains the first man "the light is much better over here."

Is it odd to commemorate something with no particular attempt to do so on the day in question? I can see moving a celebration to a Saturday when the actual day falls during the week or on a Sunday. Does the celebration lose its significance when we just pick another date? Or is the date unimportant when compared to the event itself. Jesus was not born on Christmas.

New Family Search dot Org

I'm having som fun with New.FamilySearch.org. While I have thought it was high time the technology the church was using caught up with the other offerings online, this isn't quite it. Don't get me wrong. It is much closer. And I understand that it is in the pilot stage. But to be honest, I fell like a beta tester.

I love that I can add people in real time. I love that I and my parents are in the data base. I love that I can print off temple ready names from home and take them strait to the temple.

I don't like that the online database has every error anyone has ever made in my family line perpetuated forever. I don't like that when I make a mistake it takes me an hour to fix it. I don't like that when I run across data that is new that I can't download it. I don't like how although I am signed in I can't connect my wife's side of the family without manually creating a new record just because I'm not related to them closely enough. Come on! They're my in-laws, not strangers.

And one idea that is unrelated to the new software but since I'm in the mood to complain. I want to know when ancestors of mine were first baptised. In fact, each time they were baptised would be great, even if it is a partial date, so long as it was during their lifetime. But the current practice is to use the most current date. So when someone mistakenly does proxy work for someone who had joined during the life, all I see is the the 1949 baptism date when I know they joined the church around 1835.

Private Historian

I was reading an account of Will Bagley yesterday and his research into the Mountain Meadows. Apparently he was being paid to do the research and so when it came time to publish his findings there was some difficulty determining the ownership of the material. His employer was apparently on the run for tax evasion and all his assets were "tied up". To solve the problem, Mr. Bagley proposed he purchase the rights to the research so he could publish. Accordingly the courts assessed the value of his work, including expenses over a little less than 2 years, at $250,000.

I had no idea private historian work was so lucrative. I suppose if you are flying back and forth across the west the expenses can pile up. I know we all have our opinions of Will Bagley, but anyone know how accurate that figure is?

Ruth Stratton Curtis

Ruth was born on the 23 Feb 1795 in New Salem, Massachusetts. Her family, and her future husband's family both moved to Erie, Pennsylvania. There, she and her husband, Jeremiah Curtis, were married. Her husband was a widower with no children. Their first and second children they named after Jeremiah's first wife Aurelia Meacham.

Jeremiah's family was close, and like many close families on the frontier, they moved together. In 1826, they moved from Erie PA to Pontiac Michigan. Ruth's parents moved along with them.

In Pontiac they heard the message of Joseph Smith and most of the extended family converted to Mormonism. Aurelia Curtis married a returned member of Zion's Camp, Ornan Houghton, and the two of them moved to Missouri. Ruth allowed them to take one of her own daughters, Mary, with them.

Jeremiah and Ruth followed with the rest of their children but were soon driven out of the state. They ended up in Nauvoo, Illinois. In Nauvoo Jeremiah's brother Jacob died and he took in Jacobs children.

The records indicate they were somehow involved with Lyman Wight. Unless they were assigned to work in the pineries in Wisconsin, they would have no reason to follow him. So at some point part of the family may have been in Wisconsin. I do see the names, Mitchell and Stephen Curtis being sent by Lyman Wight from Wisconsin with a message for Joseph Smith. In addition, William, Meacham, and Eliza Curtis appear in other records as well. But Ruth and her husband appear to have stayed in Nauvoo.

Since Lyman Wight left Wisconsin and went directly to Texas without a stop in Nauvoo, Jeremiah and Ruth must have met them along the way.

Ruth's husband, Jeremiah, died along the way. According to one account they were already in Texas. But the pull to bring together the extended family was strong. After hearing about the death of Mary's husband, her son, Meacham, went back to Nauvoo to bring her and children back to Texas. Meacham was unable to convince her to go.

The 1850 census places Ruth living in Bandera, Texas with her children and some of her brother-in-law Jacob's children. Ruth died in 1859. Her son led the surviving family to the San Joaquin valley in California. Oral tradition says they went by way of the Isthmus of Panama. Though another account claims they followed Noah Smithwick, who went overland.

How do I ask?

I received a package from a distant cousin a couple of weeks ago. It contained some genealogical information and was much bigger than I expected. So it is taking some time to review. But I wanted to share some anxiety I felt. The cousin who sent the info is descended through a branch of the family that did not follow Brigham Young to Utah. Her ancestors followed Lyman Wight and eventually joined the Reorganized church (now the Community of Christ). I know she knows where my side of the family went, and I see data obviously provided by LDS researchers in the past. One was my grandfather which is kind of cool. But I am hesitant to ask the question of her religious affiliation. It's silly, I know, but there it is.
Part of my hesitation is that ...
1) Religion is almost a taboo subject to discuss, at least in the USA, and although we are cousins, she is basically a stranger.
2) I don't know how to ask. "Are you Mormon?" doesn't get specific enough to remove the abiguity. She may be Mormon but not share my denomination.
3) Her answer really should be irrelevant. It should not change our working relationship. So why even ask?

And for those of you who are both curious and nosy, I did eventually ask. She does not belong to the CoC. She joined the Mormon church as an adult not originally knowing her family's ties to Mormon history.