Quote:
Originally posted by RACooper
While you see it from a non-religious perspective there are those of us that cannot divorce our faith from our religious convictions.
Many people here on GC find the concept of being told what and how to think or believe repelent - and rightly so. These pathetic tools are challenging/robbing/ignoring/disrespectring Jews (and others) of both their historical and religious beliefs... all in the name of a arrogant disregard for others and their beliefs - it passes beyond "good taste" and becomes insulting to a faith belief system...
It saddens me that these "people" have taken it upon themselves to assume that they are the final arbitor of what is the correct faith - and then force that belief upon others, in life and in death... this even surpases the decidely criminal actions of my own Church (Catholic) during the Crusades - at least the Catholic Church allowed the dead to remain true to their faith. These assholes haven't even afforded the dead that....
Now to put this in context - if they are determined to "baptize" Jews who have died... does that mean that they are "baptizing" Jews that died during the Holocaust? I'd hope that no one thinks that that is even remotelt acceptable - even a proxy baptisim insults the faith of those that died for their faith and those that died as firm believers.
Personally I'm looking into this here in Canada - if the Mormons are participating in this reprehensible act I will be more than happy to lend my voice to those advocating that the 'church' be charge for violating the tenents, if not the legality, of the freedom and respect of religious freedom here.
|
By "seeing this from a non-religious perspective," I meant that I am not a religious person.
The Mormons are NOT actually converting these people. In order to convert to Mormonism, there are two steps: you need to actively make a choice to accept it, and you need to be baptized. Mormons believe that the first step -- choosing to become Mormon -- can be done after death, when a person is in heaven. They believe that baptism can only occur on earth, either by real baptism or by proxy. Thus conversion is not the issue here -- Mormons just feel that, by baptizing this people, they are preparing them for the act of conversion. Baptism itself is not conversion, however.
In response to ASUADPi -- Mormons believe that their view of heaven is the only correct one. They assume that, even if you were another religious faith on earth and you were devoted enough to die for that faith -- if you get to heaven and you were wrong and God really is Mormon, you'd convert.
Proxy baptisms are recorded as proxy baptisms, not as actual baptisms.
RUGreek -- did you even read this thread? Baptism is different from conversion. There's no way this practice could send anybody to hell (or heaven) by itself. Conversion cannot take place without the person (or whatever they are after death) does not accept Mormonism as truth. Which, uh, if they're Jewish, they probably won't. Thus why this is a non-issue to me.