GIVE ME A BREAK!

"Testimony to the Timpanogos Indians" ...?

Give me a break! I came upon the website called "Parley P. Pratt" today 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 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 they too were made to live on the reservation. Meanwhile the Mormon church stole 260 thousand square miles of Timpanogos land, much of which is the most fertile land in the state 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."
 

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. (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."