Boyd Packer says to avoid 'Tolerance Trap'

[FaxModem1]

Huffington Post

Boyd Packer, Top Mormon, Warns Of Immorality 'Tolerance Trap'

Religion News Service | By Lisa Schnecker Posted: 04/08/2013 2:09 pm EDT | Updated: 04/08/2013 2:17 pm EDT
Share on Google+
Boyd Packer Tolerance
42
8
2
172
Get Religion Alerts:
Sign Up
Follow:
LDS Tolerance, LDS Church, Mormon Gay Marriage, Boyd-Packer, Lds, Religion News

SALT LAKE CITY (RNS) Just because the nation may change its laws to "tolerate legalized acts of immorality" does not make those acts any less spiritually damaging, senior Mormon apostle Boyd K. Packer said Saturday (April 6) at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' 183rd Annual General Conference.

"The permissiveness afforded by the weakening of the laws of the land to tolerate legalized acts of immorality," Packer said, "does not reduce the serious spiritual consequences that result from the violation of God's law of chastity."

Packer, president of the Mormons' Quorum of Twelve Apostles and next in line to take over the church's reins, didn't specifically mention gay marriage, but his comments came amid controversy on the issue nationwide and a significant swing in public and political opinion toward favoring such same-sex unions.

The U.S. Supreme Court is considering two cases on the matter, one concerning whether to uphold California's Proposition 8, which Mormons heavily backed to limit marriage to unions between men and women, and the other on the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which also defines marriage as between a man and a woman.

In addition, the Boy Scouts of America recently announced it is weighing whether to lift a long-standing ban on allowing openly gay members and leaders in the organization. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the nation's largest sponsor of Scouting.

"Tolerance is a virtue, but, like all virtues, when exaggerated it transforms itself into a vice," said the 88-year-old Packer, speaking from his chair rather than from the pulpit. "We need to be careful of the'tolerance trap' so that we are not swallowed up in it."

(Lisa Schencker writes for The Salt Lake Tribune.)

Tolerance can be a vice, huh?

[Junghalli]

Tolerance can be a vice, huh?

There are plenty of behaviors I imagine most liberals would not want to see society tolerate too.

Just saying.

[Guardsman Bass]

Packer has been like that forever. He was the one who warned that the "three enemies of the church" were homosexuals, feminists, and intellectuals, and he was behind the "September Six" ex-communications back in the 1990s.

[The Yosemite Bear]

clean those child raping polygamous sects out first before you suggest that anything between two concenting audlts is immoral. This goes double for the Pope.

[Korto]

^ And in one sentence sums up perfectly where tolerance is, and tolerance is not, appropriate.

[The Yosemite Bear]

I'm asexual, I'm sick of the Morman and Catholic Churches spending millions against minority groups rights here in my home state. So I've been kinda saving that rejoinder for a post since 2008

[Guardsman Bass]

They tried that back in the 1950s, pushing for the Short Creek Raid by the Arizona state government to arrest them and break up the polygamist community there (and which is still there). It back-fired on them, drawing national criticism.

There was a time when the Mormon Church was still sheltering polygamists (probably as late as the 1930s), but now they're pretty anti-polygamist, at least in this life (the after-life is another question). The FLDS people are a huge embarrassment for them, and the dislike is mutual with the FLDS leadership.

[Darth Lucifer]

clean those child raping polygamous sects out first before you suggest that anything between two concenting audlts is immoral. This goes double for the Pope.

The mainstream LDS church does not associate with and has no influence over the RLDS, FLDS and other Mormon fundamentalists. In fact, the LDS tries to distance itself from those groups as much as possible ever since they backpedaled on sanctioning plural marriages.

One of the questions during a Temple Recommend interview with a Bishop is "Do you support, affiliate with, or agree with any group or individual whose teachings or practices are contrary to or oppose those accepted by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints?" A Bishop explained to me once that this would include LDS offshoot groups like the above.

Funny enough, the mainstream Mormons still think plural marriages are OK as long as they are authorized by God, but otherwise there is very little mention of polygamy these days. LDS dogma also points to the fact that the church has left open room so that they may one day re-institute polygamy if God permits it once again. And of course, if you do multiple "sealings" on Earth here (say a guys first wife died and then the guy re-marries), then anyone you ever "sealed" with will be there waiting for you in the afterlife...a form of spiritual polygamy, if you will.

[Dr. Trainwreck]

Funny enough, the mainstream Mormons still think plural marriages are OK as long as they are authorized by God, but otherwise there is very little mention of polygamy these days. LDS dogma also points to the fact that the church has left open room so that they may one day re-institute polygamy if God permits it once again. And of course, if you do multiple "sealings" on Earth here (say a guys first wife died and then the guy re-marries), then anyone you ever "sealed" with will be there waiting for you in the afterlife...a form of spiritual polygamy, if you will.

I don't know your leanings, and no offense meant, but this looks like they reject polygamy only in a very specific form that happens to be politically embarassing. That bit about remarrying as a widower is neat, though. Does it extend to women as well?

[Lord Relvenous]

Funny enough, the mainstream Mormons still think plural marriages are OK as long as they are authorized by God, but otherwise there is very little mention of polygamy these days. LDS dogma also points to the fact that the church has left open room so that they may one day re-institute polygamy if God permits it once again. And of course, if you do multiple "sealings" on Earth here (say a guys first wife died and then the guy re-marries), then anyone you ever "sealed" with will be there waiting for you in the afterlife...a form of spiritual polygamy, if you will.

I don't know your leanings, and no offense meant, but this looks like they reject polygamy only in a very specific form that happens to be politically embarassing. That bit about remarrying as a widower is neat, though. Does it extend to women as well?

Surprise, surprise, it does not. Women may only be sealed to one man, so if a widow remarries, she has to decide which husband to be sealed to.

[Ralin]

Surprise, surprise, it does not. Women may only be sealed to one man, so if a widow remarries, she has to decide which husband to be sealed to.

I'm kind of surprised they don't forbid women from remarrying, in that case.

[Lord Relvenous]

Surprise, surprise, it does not. Women may only be sealed to one man, so if a widow remarries, she has to decide which husband to be sealed to.

I'm kind of surprised they don't forbid women from remarrying, in that case.

If they had done that, Brigham Young wouldn't have been able to marry a good amount of his wives, many of which were widows (16 at the very least). As it was Brigham Young who really pushed polygamy, the lack of that kind of doctrine isn't so surprising.

[The Yosemite Bear]

mind you for reverse polygamous sets there's emma place (akka Mrs Sundance, & Mrs Butch Cassidy)

[Civil War Man]

mind you for reverse polygamous sets there's emma place (akka Mrs Sundance, & Mrs Butch Cassidy)

Just fyi, the official term is polyandry.

[Terralthra]

Technically, polygamous is still just fine, since it just means multiple marriages or multiple spouses. To properly differentiate between the two, you'd need to use polyandry - multiple husbands - and polygyny - multiple wives.

[Esquire]

Not so - just like polyandry and polygyny, polygamy means having multiple spouses simultaneously, not sequentially. It's a larger category including both the gender-specific nouns, not a different thing.

Of course, that's in Ancient Greek. In English polygyny arguably isn't a word and everybody knows what polygamy means.

[DieselJester]

Funny enough, the mainstream Mormons still think plural marriages are OK as long as they are authorized by God, but otherwise there is very little mention of polygamy these days. LDS dogma also points to the fact that the church has left open room so that they may one day re-institute polygamy if God permits it once again. And of course, if you do multiple "sealings" on Earth here (say a guys first wife died and then the guy re-marries), then anyone you ever "sealed" with will be there waiting for you in the afterlife...a form of spiritual polygamy, if you will.

"Authorized by God?" How do they define that exactly?

[chitoryu12]

Funny enough, the mainstream Mormons still think plural marriages are OK as long as they are authorized by God, but otherwise there is very little mention of polygamy these days. LDS dogma also points to the fact that the church has left open room so that they may one day re-institute polygamy if God permits it once again. And of course, if you do multiple "sealings" on Earth here (say a guys first wife died and then the guy re-marries), then anyone you ever "sealed" with will be there waiting for you in the afterlife...a form of spiritual polygamy, if you will.

"Authorized by God?" How do they define that exactly?

Generally the same way any church decides how God changed his mind: the church leaders say so.

[Terralthra]

Not so - just like polyandry and polygyny, polygamy means having multiple spouses simultaneously, not sequentially. It's a larger category including both the gender-specific nouns, not a different thing.

Of course, that's in Ancient Greek. In English polygyny arguably isn't a word and everybody knows what polygamy means.

Arguably isn't a word? I'm curious how you reach that conclusion.

Anyway, Etta Place was cohabiting with both Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid simultaneously. Whether they were married is up for debate, so far as I know. My point was that you don't have to call it "reverse polygamy" if it's more than one male spouse. Polygamy applies to both.

[Grumman]

Of course, that's in Ancient Greek. In English polygyny arguably isn't a word and everybody knows what polygamy means.

Of course it's an English word, we stole it fair and square.

[Dr. Trainwreck]

Of course, that's in Ancient Greek. In English polygyny arguably isn't a word and everybody knows what polygamy means.

Of course it's an English word, we stole it fair and square.

Appropriation by usage is legal in linguistics anyway.

[Terralthra]

It's not exactly an Ancient Greek work anyway. It's neo-greek.

[Ralin]

Funny enough, the mainstream Mormons still think plural marriages are OK as long as they are authorized by God, but otherwise there is very little mention of polygamy these days. LDS dogma also points to the fact that the church has left open room so that they may one day re-institute polygamy if God permits it once again. And of course, if you do multiple "sealings" on Earth here (say a guys first wife died and then the guy re-marries), then anyone you ever "sealed" with will be there waiting for you in the afterlife...a form of spiritual polygamy, if you will.

"Authorized by God?" How do they define that exactly?

Generally the same way any church decides how God changed his mind: the church leaders say so.

Though I'm guessing Mormons take that more seriously than most. Anecdotally, I'm friends with an atheist philosophy professor who used to live in Utah and he's told me that the Mormons he knew there took decisions by the LDS leadership as literal commandments from God. Meaning that when they decreed that henceforth polygamy was not acceptable that was that and whenever he pointed out the problems they would just say, "Oh, we don't think about that."

[Korto]

In case this runs off on an anti-polygamy wagon, I want to make it plain I have no problem with multiple partners, as long as all partners are informed, consenting, adults. As long as that's the case, I don't give a crap.
I object to cases where pressure was brought to bear and/or a partner is under-aged.

[Dr. Trainwreck]

Well, if all these people can manage to agree on something like that, that's no harm to me. But I noticed this hypocrisy of condemning polygamy to outsiders, while internally they keep saying there's not a problem if God likes it. If you tell me there's this difference of divine approval, why don't they make the distinction clear to outsiders?

But then it's about religion in general: no church speaks of hellfire to strangers. Probably because most of them come from a time when killing an infidel was acceptable, so they tried to hide the bigger unpleasantries.