Give me a break!
According to LDS church doctrine (Book of Mormon 2 Nephi 5:21-23) the nature of their dark skin was a curse, the cause was the Lord, the reason was because the Lamanites (Native Americans) "had hardened their hearts against him, (God)" and the punishment was to make them "loathsome" unto God's people who had white skins.
I came upon the website
called "Parley P. Pratt" and found this:
"As the Book of Mormon is very
concerned with the history of the Native Americans, Mormons have always been
interested in spreading the Gospel to them. Apostle Francis Marion Lyman
went on a number of missions to the American Indian tribes throughout Utah,
some of which were partly focused on making certain these tribes had fertile
land to work with, beyond teaching the Gospel as revealed through Joseph
Smith."
I normally don't get upset at other
people's articles, but this one really made my blood boil. The sentence
"making certain these tribes had fertile land to work with" has anyone
visited the Uinta Valley Reservation and looked at the so called "fertile" land the
Timpanogos were given to work with? Well in case you haven't look at this
photo
which gives us an idea of the so called "fertile land" the Timpanogos were exiled
to beginning in 1868. Of the three million acres they were originally
allotted, less than 25% of that land remains, the rest, the most fertile,
was turned back to public domain. The Timpanogos were given a choice, either join
the church and do everything the Mormons commanded them to do or suffer dire
consequences. And suffer they did, even though many did join the church their most valued land was stolen
and were made to live on the reservation. Meanwhile the Mormon church stole
260 thousand square miles of Timpanogos land, "we tried to take from them their hunting rights, their fishing rights, the timber on their land. We tried to take from them their water rights. We tried to take from them their culture, their religion, their identity, and perhaps most importantly, we tried to take from them their freedom." said Dr. Daniel McCool professor Universirty of Utah.
The above article I cited is a classic
example of the kind of sugar-coated rhetoric, filled with platitudes, I have
referred to many times on my website here.
Contemporary Mormons say this: "It's a rather common mistake for
uninformed people to think these type of verses in the scriptures mean that
righteous people will be Caucasians on the day of judgment. Certainly that
is the conclusion that most of the anti-Mormons want people to draw. They
would like to make people to falsely believe we are racist.
Surely the critics aren't suggesting that garments, robes, and fruits
are being made Caucasian? To reiterate, the Book of Mormon used imagery,
symbolism, and metaphors quite frequently. The term white is often used to
denote holy and pure things, especially things which have been cleansed by
the blood of Jesus Christ. When the Book of Mormon refers to someone's skin
becoming white, it is a metaphor meaning that they are becoming free from
sin through Jesus' Atonement."
LDS Church leader Brigham Young had a different opinion: "You see some classes of the
human family that are black, uncouth, uncomely, disagreeable and low in
their habits, wild, and seemingly without the blessings of the intelligence
that is generally bestowed upon mankind... "Cain slew his brother.... and
the Lord put a mark upon him, which is a flat nose and black skin. (B. Young, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 7, pp. 290-291)
Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African race? If the
white man...mixes his blood with the seed of Cain, the penalty, under the
law of God, is death on the spot. This will always be so." (B. Young,
Journal of Discourses, Vol. 10, 110)
Well this is one Mormon who believes in truth. And for anyone to suggest
that the Timpanogos were treated compassionately, and with equality is absurd. In
the words of Dr. Floyd O'Neil, "You can't stretch a rats ass over a rain barrel."
See: The Utah Black Hawk War