Let me put my opinion of the Mountain Meadows Massacre out there up front.
MMM is a tragic, shameful event that should bring some humility to every Latter-Day Saint. It was an atrocity which should not be excused, from which we should learn, and which we should continue to ensure will never happen again.
However, the evidence I have seen does not demonstrate that the LDS Church, as an organization, was responsible. This atrocity was committed by a group of renegades. Indeed, the Mormon leadership at the time did what they could to prevent it. Those who think that Brigham Young condoned or ordered the massacre are wide of the mark.
There are extenuating circumstances which may serve to -explain- why the perpetrators committed this act, and these circumstances may be explored to some profit; but they should not be used to -excuse- the act.
Where I do think the LDS Church bears some responsibility is in the follow-up. The Church should have worked harder to punish the perpetrators. I think this failed responsibility was an impetus behind the construction of the memorial at Church expense a few years ago.
All that said, what I've learned about the movie "September Dawn" has convinced me that it is essentially a hit piece on Mormonism. Being LDS myself, this doesn't concern me too much, as America's grown quite skeptical of anything coming from the movie industry.
Ping
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CC, I know you’ve studied this issue extensively. Please ping those who you think would also be interested in this topic.
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The issue of how main-stream Christians interacted with followers of Joseph Smith is a sad chapter in US history. But it is not all one sided. For example, only about 30 years ago did the State of Missouri repeal a law that excluded killing Mormons from the definition of murder.
Actually, it sounds pretty truthful.
Mormonism and Islam are very similar: syncretist theocratic cults based on the dream of a charismatic founder and having the goal of territorial and political domination. We’re just lucky that the Mormons, faced with growing opposition by other Americans and under pressure to renounce some of their more egregious practices in exchange for statehood, split into a more moderate group (the LDS church in SLC) and lots of smaller radical groups, most of whose members only commit personal crimes against other Mormons (the guy who kidnapped Elizabeth Smart was one of these cultists).
The mainstream LDS church is busy remaking itself as an evangelical Christian church, which is fine by me and a big relief to us all.
On the other hand, maybe the territorial claims of Mohammed’s followers and those of Joseph Smith’s followers would have come into conflict and the Muslim problem would have been solved once and for ever.
This hit piece shows the typical moral cowardice of the Left, focusing on incidents from the ancient history of their opponents and ignoring the bloody work of those they support and condone.
John D Lee claimed it was church leadership that ordered it, though.
The handcart expedition was leadership organized and ordered, too, and that was a dismal failure with hundreds dying.
The timing of this movie is the most important piece of the story. Hollywood is busy, busy, busy working for “their girl”, Hillary.
They shot the ring leader, fair trial, my Grand Father thought this was biggest slander on Mormonism in his life time, Hated Mark Twain.
And you saved the best for last. This one three word phrase explains why you are so quick to pawn the Mountain Meadows Massacre off on "renegades". You sound exactly like the supposedly "peaceful Muslims".
Now - I don't know you, and you may very well be a very honorable, conservative, and honest upstanding person. I just suggest that a Mormon might not be the most reliable source for information on the MMM.
In all of the reading on the subject I have done, I have yet to find any source whatsoever (outside the Mormon Church itself) that completely exonerates Brigham Young and the church leaders at the time.
Actually, this fits a pattern of Hollywood. Everyone’s a terrorist except the actual Islamist Jihadists. Only 24 managed to portray muslims as terrorists in post-9-11 tv/movies.
Possibly correct, if you limit the "LDS church as an organization" to Brigham Young and the supreme leadership in SLC. Even there, they used rhetoric in the weeks before the massacre that can easily be interpreted as a call to do exactly what the Mormons in SW Utah did.
Those who committed the massacre were not "renegades," although the Church turned J.D. Lee into one after the massacre as a scapegoat. It was performed by the local militia in their formed groups, amd was organized by the local authorities, who combined religious and secular authority.
Indeed, the Mormon leadership at the time did what they could to prevent it. Those who think that Brigham Young condoned or ordered the massacre are wide of the mark.
Nope. "Mormon leadership," in any reasonable sense of the term, would include the local authorities in SW Utah, who not only did not attempt to prevent, but were actually the ones who organized and perpetrated it.
BY probably tried to stop it at the last moment. Given his rhetoric in the preceding weeks, this may have been a case of chickening out, or he may have indeed had a change of heart, but too late. In any case, he certainly shares some responsibility for creating the climate of fear and vengeance that led up to the massacre.
There are extenuating circumstances which may serve to -explain- why the perpetrators committed this act, and these circumstances may be explored to some profit; but they should not be used to -excuse- the act.
Thanks for saying this. I have had some discussions with Mormons who attempt to excuse the massacre as self-defense. I'm glad you're not among them.
It is also only fair to point out that similar extenuating circumstances explain much of the hostility to Mormon in MO and IL that led to their persecution and expulsion, but these extenuating circumstances should similarly not be used to excuse the persecution.
The Church should have worked harder to punish the perpetrators. I think this failed responsibility was an impetus behind the construction of the memorial at Church expense a few years ago.
I think a reasonable person would conclude that the Church, for many decades after the MMM, was involved in a conspiracy to obstruct justice and cover up the atrocity. Why exactly they did so is not and probably never will be clear, as the coverup and destruction of evidence was largely successful, but a not unreasonable conclusion is that "the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth" would have been damaging, possibly fatal, to the church and its leadership.
All that said, what I've learned about the movie "September Dawn" has convinced me that it is essentially a hit piece on Mormonism.
MMM was the most horrifying atrocity ever to take place on American soil, and was worse in some ways than any of the Nazi atrocities such as Lidice. I think it is odd that such a movie hasn't been made before. After all, we've had something like a dozen movies about the "shootout at the OK corral," which had something like five people killed, all of them armed.
Not seen the movie nor do I plan to . However for Hollywood Mormoms are considered “conventional”Christian and white male Christian at that.
And we all know how Hollywood protrays traditional values, bible believing people.....
That said, I have found the Mormon people here to be forthright and honorable, although sometimes quite quirky. The owner of the company I work for is what you might call "tough but fair". I find that refreshing in so many ways....
That's my take on the whole matter of todays Mormonism in a nutshell. I choose not to dwell on the history of any faith in todays world, other than Islam, whose practioners seemingly have not moved forward or back...they will kill or enslave me if I do not follow them.
FMCDH(BITS)
That IS bizarre, given that both are cults and allow multiple wives.
One would think they should be treated the same.
I wonder if SEPTEMBER Dawn is the answer to RED Dawn.
Okay, I’ve avoided commenting on the whole Romney-Mormon issue, even where the Mountain Meadows Massacre was brought in. I’m going to post this once, and will make no further comment. I will immediately be accused of (a) hating Mormons; (b) taking things out of context; (c) being ignorant; or any number of other things by people who can’t/won’t take an objective approach to LDS history. None of the accusations will be justified, but they will flow freely from people who upon investigating the church’s claim to authority, immediately cast aside the very means by which God instructed us to test such claims. There is plenty of documentation for what I post here, but if your mind is open enough to truth, you will investigate things for yourself. I have no patience for leading someone by the nose through each and every historical record.
To claim that the Mountain Meadows Massacre was some aberration that Brigham Young knew nothing about or tried to stop is twelve kinds of absurd.
Utah at that time was comparable to Iraq under Saddam Hussein. You didn’t blow your nose without Young’s permission. Troublemakers disappeared, and their possessions were redistributed on the QT.
John D. Lee, eventually made the fall guy and executed for his part in the massacre, was the leader of the Danites, a group which served Brigham Young in much the same way that the SS served Hitler. Further, Lee had been “sealed” to Young in a temple ceremony that, in effect, made him Young’s adopted son. So there is no credible way that the attack did not take place without the express knowledge and approval of Young. One account cites a chief from the Indian tribe involved as stating that he received a message from Young asking for his cooperation.
To this day, the official LDS line is to somewhat excuse the attack as a response to Mormon persecution in Missouri, and the rumor spread at the time the Fancher train was passing through Utah — to the effect that Missouri “wildcatters” were among the group and were purposely insulting Mormons and their leadership — continue to be dragged out without a shred of evidence to back such an absurd premise up. To believe that a train would provoke the very populace on whom they would depend for supplies during their passage strains credibility beyond the breaking point.
However, regardless of any other specifics, or the lack of a “smoking gun,” I return to my first point; that, given Lee’s relationship with Young and his role as leader of the Danites, there is simply zero chance that Young didn’t sign off on the attack.
Care to challenge these assertions? Fine, do your homework. Read the various books that document the times, the people, and the massacre.
Oh, and to those who think that it’s irrelevant to how we should regard the LDS church today; if Brigham Young was part of such a horrible atrocity, it taints his claim to being a man of God just as much if the apostle Peter were accused of same. We are not talking about some rogue church member or official. We are talking about the man who picked up the alleged prophetic mantle from Joseph Smith, the church founder; and who arguably did even more to shape the direction of the church.
“Mormons won’t respond with any comparable rage, no matter how badly September Dawn tarnishes the memory of their faith’s founders. In fact, the LDS Church has adopted an official policy of ‘no comment’ regarding the film, and there have been no examples of young Mormons strapping dynamite to their bodies and blowing themselves up to protest perceived insults to their religion. They have cheerfully endured another recent film assault (Jane Fonda’s Georgia Rule) that showed Mormons as stupid, petty, sexually repressed losers, and an edgy episode of TV’s South Park showing the story of Joseph Smith with a background chorus describing it as ‘dumb-dumb-dumb.’”
This too shall pass.