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Mormon Tabernacle Choir sings the LDS Hymn “High on the Mountain Top”. Martin Luther King delivers his famous last speech “I’ve been to the Mountain Top” the day before he is assassinated on 04 April 1968.

“There is no easy walk to freedom anywhere, and many of us will have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death again and again before we reach the mountaintop of our desires” - Nelson Mandela

Call for Papers A conference sponsored by the Latter-day Saint Council on Mormon Studies, and the Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, and held at Claremont Graduate University, Claremont, CA. March 18-19, 2011 . . In a world pervaded with religious fervor and seemingly perpetual war, it has become essential for religious believers to consider the realities of violent conflict and the possibiliti … Read More

via latter day satyagraha

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The lyrics of the Battle Hymn of the Republic appear in Martin Luther King, Jr.s sermons and speeches, most notably in his speech How Long, Not Long from the steps of the Montgomery, Alabama Courthouse on March 25, 1965 after the 3rd Selma March, and in his final sermon Ive Been to the Mountaintop, delivered in Memphis, Tennessee on the evening of April 3, 1968, the night before his assassination. In fact, the latter sermon, Kings last public words, ends with the first lyrics of the Battle Hymn, Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

In 1960 the Mormon Tabernacle Choir won the Grammy Award for their rendering of ‘the Battle Hymn of the Republic’ as the Best Performance by a Vocal Group or Chorus. The single record had reached #13 on Billboards Hot 100 the previous fall.

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For most Christians in North America, the problem with traditional liberation theology is that it cannot speak to them. Not being poor, they are not the people of God. However, the Book of Mormon’s theology of liberation speaks to the powerful, prideful, and privileged. It warns of their damnation. For it is clear that in the Book of Mormon, the people of God (i.e. the Nephites, the righteous, the Church, etc.) continually become evil and wicked due to their pride and wealth. The righteous’ turn to pride inevitably leads to a socio-economic division, which is inherently sinful. The wealthy of contemporary society should see their reflection in the text. The text is a warning to the people of God, describing how they will fall (have fallen) from grace.

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In order to defend my claim that the Book of Mormon supports a unique theology of liberation in which the powerful and rich are the people of God and must divest themselves of their power and wealth, I will look at 4 Nephi. Nephi will provide us with a standard with which we can begin our interpretation of the rest of the Book of Mormon. A text must be read in terms of its purpose. The Book of Mormon is supposed to tell us how to live our lives. If so, then we should look at the part of the book in which the people successfully build a Christian community as a guide to an interpretation of the rest of the book: 4 Nephi.

Not only is this section the paradigm of righteousness, it is a microcosm of the whole Book of Mormon. It is a story that parallels the entire history of the Nephites and Lamanites condensed into several dozen pages. Some, like Nibley, argue that wealth is not inherently sinful (Since Cumorah, p.355). It is certainly not necessarily the case that being wealthy is sinful. But when it is coupled with inequality it is always sinful in the Book of Mormon. See also D&C 104. Indeed, the title page says that it was written so that the Gentile (among others) would not be destroyed.

At the very beginning of the book, we are reminded that Jesus has formed the Church and the people have repented and become “members.” The first thing this leads to is that …there were no disputations among them, and every man did deal justly one with another. And they had all things in common among them; therefore there were not rich nor poor, bond and free, but they were all made free, and partakers of the heavenly gift. (4 Nephi, 1: 2-3) The lack of disputations signals the extent to which this is now a community and not just a bunch of people living together.

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all things in common among them

Community involves a social cohesion that is not a necessary element in a society. Society is necessarily social but not necessarily communal. Community involves a social cohesion that is largely destroyed by the individualist ethic in our modern capitalist society. It is a state of communion, such as that found in the most ideal familial relationships. It is based on the pure love of Christ.

Sometimes it is argued that the lack of disputations indicates only the lack of any theological disputations. It is not at all clear that this refers to theological disputations. There is no mention of doctrinal disputes. Moreover, this claim is put in an explicitly political and economic context, being framed by the questions of justice and economic distribution. It is more likely that the disputations being discussed are of a social nature and not a doctrinal one.

This people also have “all things in common among them.” At the very least, this is the claim that there is an economic egalitarianism in the community. It may also involve the stronger claim that there is no private property at all. It is clear that “substance” includes material substance, since in verses 24 and 25 it is the accumulation of unnecessary wealth that leads to them not having “their goods and their substance” in common any longer. This also leads to the society being divided into classes––i.e., where there are poor and rich among them. Clearly, some kind of economic communism is afoot.

Additionally, there are no bond and free. Every one is free. No one is enslaved or imprisoned. Indeed, later when the economic class division begins to occur again, among the first events is that the powerful create prisons and imprison the people of Christ (4 Nephi 1:30). Conspicuously absent is the lack of any mention of a government or hierarchy of any other kind. To be sure, a church is formed with disciples. But no organizational structure is mentioned. No kings, prophets, or judges are mentioned. It would be an argument from ignorance to suggest that this fact alone is reason to think that there was no government or institutional hierarchy. But we may suggest that the economic communism and political freedom seems to be more important to the author than any element of church or governmental organization. It is also important that the terms “power” and “authority” are mentioned as something taken by the unrighteous to dominate the righteous (4 Nephi 1:30). These terms are not used to describe the position of the disciples in the society of Christ’s church.

It is significant that this chapter starts off with a description of the political and economic conditions of the people of Christ’s church. Where is the discussion of personal and/or individual morality? The morality that matters here is a communal morality. Here there is a focus on the moral issues that affect the community. In fact, the drama of righteousness and unrighteousness is played out on the communal stage. It is not an individual matter. There is no discussion of individuals’ stories, only the initially wonderful but eventually tragic story of a community of Christ. To be sure, there are evils perpetrated by individuals, but what matters are the institutional evils that are the result of a radically evil form of life.

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one cannot be exalted on one’s own

Here I am appealing to a difference between individual morality and community morality, individual sin and communal sin. It seems clear to me that these are distinct and that one cannot reduce communal morality to individual morality. Mormonism’s soteriology (doctrine of salvation) is clearly committed to a notion of communal morality. The argument for this is based on the premise that exaltation is the state of being in the presence of one’s family and God. However, if one’s other family members choose not to be exalted then this is not possible. Obviously, one cannot fulfill this obligation alone.

So, it follows that it is a communal obligation. One cannot be exalted on one’s own. It is true that personal sin is intimately connected with communal sin, and hence is present in proportional degrees with the latter in society. This explains why 4 Nephi mentions the lack of sexual sin in this communal society (4 Nephi 1:16), but does so 13 verses after mentioning the economic morality of this community of Christ. Indeed, there are sociological reasons to believe that personally destructive behavior in the form of sexual promiscuity, drug or alcohol abuse, theft, domestic violence, and the like is directly linked to economics. Capitalism is a system in which one is urged to look out for one’s own needs and ignore, if not neglect, others’ needs. If this attitude is taken from the economic realm to other areas of behavior, then we should not be surprised if our society has an abundance of personal moral sin.

As I argued above, liberation theology emphasizes the communal or societal aspect of the sin that leads to oppression. Right-wing Christians argue that all problems in society can be traced back to individual or personal sins. Such a view is incomplete in its understanding of the nature of the human fall. In his seminal work of liberation theology, Gustavo Gutiérrez says,

[I]n the liberation approach sin is not considered as an individual, private, or merely interior reality––asserted just enough to necessitate “spiritual” redemption which does not challenge the order in which we live. Sin is regarded as a social, historical fact, the absence of fellowship and love in relationships among persons, the breach of friendship with God and with other persons, and, therefore, an interior, personal fracture. When it is considered in this way, the collective dimensions of sin are rediscovered. (A Theology of Liberation, (Orbis Books: 1988): 102-3)

The communitarian approach to interpreting 4 Nephi is confirmed by the fact that when the people fall, the first thing they do is abandon economic communism. Indeed, one could go so far as to identify the fall with the change in the economic form of life.

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the beginning of the end

As Hugh Nibley puts it, ‘The beginning of the end for the Nephites came when they changed their pattern of life: “And from that time forth they did have their substance no more common among them”(4 Nephi 1:25). Now the interesting thing about this change was that it was economically wise, leading immediately into a long period of unparalleled prosperity, a business civilization in which “they lay up in store in abundance, and did traffic in all manner of traffic” (4 Nephi 1:46). The unfortunate thing was that the Gadianton outfit got complete control of the economic life again. And the economic life was all that counted. The whole society was divided into economic classes (4 Nephi 1:26)… Such an economic order in which everyone was busy trafficking and getting rich was not, according to 4 Nephi, a free society. It was only under the old system, he tells us, that [they were] … “partakers of the heavenly gift” (An Approach to the Book of Mormon, pp.398-9).

This fallen society is clearly very similar to Western European and American society. It is this economic inequality and competitiveness that is the fundamental social sin, and is the downfall of the Nephite community. Similarly it will be our downfall unless we undergo a change in the form of our life.

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The above text is taken from an essay on Liberation Theology in the Book of Mormon, written by R. Dennis Potter, associate professor of philosophy at Utah Valley University. The essay may be found in its entirety at the following link: http://research.uvu.edu/potter/bomliberation.pdf

This is the fourth article in the ‘human dignity series’, where we compare the human dignity triangle with the three-fold mission of the LDS church to invite all to come unto Christ. Redeeming the dead is normally understood by LDS members as the work that goes on in temples, where temple-going members are baptized on behalf of their ancestors, those who have gone before them to the other side of the veil, as well as the family history work which is undertaken by members in order to identify the names of those ancestors.

We discuss in this article an expanded concept of redeeming the dead, that includes advocacy work on behalf of those that are kept in bondage by structures of sin and injustice, as well as the empowerment of the oppressed to free themselves from structures of death and misery. Human rights are normally understood as the pursuit of political, economic, social and cultural rights.

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let my people go

Bruce R. McConkie once taught that, ‘to the President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – the man [or woman, added by author] appointed to preside over the whole Church, and to be like unto Moses – were given the keys to gather modern Israel. Even as Moses led ancient Israel out of Egyptian bondage, so the President of the Church is believed to have the authority to lead modern Israel out of bondage of modern Egypt into Zion’.

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What is important to note however is that, according to mormon theology, Moses, the great advocate for the freedom of his people, has given the same keys of gathering and of delivering the modern tribes of Israel to Joseph Smith Jr., the first President of the LDS church, who has then passed them on to his successors. The great exodus of modern Israel took place with the early pioneers who crossed the plains into the valley of the Great Salt Lake led by Brigham Young (see the Exodus Repeated).

And today, Thomas S. Monson has been called to advocate on behalf of the oppressed, the slaves of today’s world, and to organize the Lord’s people to leave modern-day Egypt behind. The understanding of the temple, of the work of redemption of the dead, must be seen in this context of deliverance: out of slavery and bondage, and into the promised land of freedom.

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But what of Martin Luther King? Wasn’t he a modern-day prophet as well, a forerunner to the blessings of the temple and the authority of the priesthood being given to all of God’s male children without regard to ethnicity and color? The mountain top of which Martin Luther King speaks in his final speech I have been to the Mountain Top could well have been a Mormon Temple – if MLK had been mormon.

Now, Thomas S. Monson was ordained an apostle in the same year MLK gave his thundering speech I Have a Dream on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Our current prophet was a contemporary of Martin Luther King Jr. What have we understood since then, as a people, of what we must do with regards to human rights, to freedom, equality and social justice ?

Do LDS members have the same visions as Martin Luther King Jr., the same dreams, the same understanding of their role as ‘saviors on mount zion’, when they go to the mountain of the Lord and worship the God of Justice? The redeeming work we perform must not only be for those who have died and are trapped in spirit prisons, but also for those who are in the modern-day Egypts of today – in this world.

Isn’t undoing the horrors and mistakes of a past generation of oppressors a way of redeeming generations gone before from the spirit prisons in which they now find themselves in? In the spheres in which they are now, they are not in a position to undo the mistakes they have done : we must correct those mistakes on their behalf. We must make right what was wrongly done. They depend on us in making the future brighter than the times past.

The Prophet Joseph Smith taught: “And now, my dearly beloved brethren and sisters, let me assure you that these principles in relation to the dead and the living cannot be lightly passed over, as pertaining to our salvation. For their salvation is necessary and essential to our salvation, as Paul says concerning the fathers – that they without us cannot be made perfect – neither can we without our dead be made perfect” (Doctrine and Covenants 128:15)

Redeeming the dead is more than just ceremonies and rituals. It is advocacy today. It is demonstrating for peace, for social justice, on behalf of the poor, of the excluded, of the marginalized, of the oppressed. It is empowering the poor with ‘great power and authority’, in the same way as priesthood authority is conveyed to those who have died, so that they may be saviors unto themselves and that they may in turn bless those who are in need of saving.

There are people dying, if you care enough for the living, make a better place for you and for me. Create a world with no fear, together we’ll cry happy tears, see the nations turn their swords into plowshares. We could really get there, if you cared enough for the living: make a little space to make a better place. Heal the world.

Liberty Jail is a former jail in Liberty, Missouri, USA where Joseph Smith, Jr. and other associates were imprisoned from December 1, 1838 to April 6, 1839 during the Mormon War. It is sometimes described as the “Prison-Temple” because of revelations Joseph had at the jail. He was to record them in Sections 121, 122, and 123 of the Doctrine and Covenants. The jail was torn down although the walls and “dungeon” were still visible when a house was built over it. In 1939 the church bought the property and in 1963 Joseph Fielding Smith presided over the establishment of a partial reconstruction of the jail wholly within a museum.

In the same year, Martin Luther King wrote a ”Letter from a Birmingham Jail” as a response to a statement made by eight white Alabama clergymen on April 12, 1963, titled “A Call For Unity”. The clergymen agreed that social injustices existed but argued that the battle against racial segregation should be fought solely in the courts, not in the streets. King responded that without nonviolent forceful direct actions such as his, true civil rights could never be achieved. He asserted that not only was civil disobedience justified in the face of unjust laws, but that “one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.”

The letter was first published as “Letter from Birmingham Jail” in the June 12, 1963,  edition of The Christian Century, almost 125 years after Joseph Smith received the revelation now recorded as Doctrine and Covenants 121 – 123 while in Liberty Jail, Missouri. As explained above, the restoration of Liberty Jail by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints was undertaken the same year as Martin Luther King, Jr. was in jail in the struggle for the civil rights of his people. Below is a rough comparison of the two letters demonstrating strong parallels between the early LDS movement and the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and the 1960s:

1 O GOD, where art thou? And where is the pavilion that covereth thy hiding place?

MLK: So I am here [...] because we were invited here. I am here because I have basic organizational ties here. Beyond this, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here.

2 How long shall thy hand be stayed, and thine eye, yea thy pure eye, behold from the eternal heavens the wrongs of thy people and of thy servants, and thine ear be penetrated with their cries?

MLK: I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.

3 Yea, O Lord, how long shall they suffer these wrongs and unlawful oppressions, before thine heart shall be softened toward them, and thy bowels be moved with compassion toward them?

MLK: I would not hesitate to say that it is unfortunate that so-called demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham at this time, but I would say in more emphatic terms that it is even more unfortunate that the white power structure of this city left the Negro community with no other alternative.

4 O Lord God Almighty, maker of heaven, earth, and seas, and of all things that in them are, and who controllest and subjectest the devil, and the dark and benighted dominion of Sheol…

MLK: Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segragated city in the United States. Its ugly record of police brutality is known in every section of this country. Its unjust treatment of Negroes in the courts is a notorious reality. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in Birmingham than any city in this nation. These are the hard, brutal and unbelievable facts.

—stretch forth thy hand; let thine eye pierce; let thy pavilion be taken up; let thy hiding place no longer be covered; let thine ear be inclined; let thine heart be softened, and thy bowels moved with compassion toward us.

MLK: So we had no alternative except that of preparing for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and national community. We were not unmindful of the difficulties involved. So we decided to go through a process of self-purification [...] and repeatedly asked ourselves the questions, “Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?” “Are you able to endure the ordeals of jail?”

5 Let thine anger be kindled against our enemies; and, in the fury of thine heart, with thy sword avenge us of our wrongs.

MLK: I must confess that I am not afraid of the word tension. I have earnestly worked and preached against violent tension, but there is a type of constructive nonviolent tension that is necessary for growth.

6 Remember thy suffering saints, O our God; and thy servants will rejoice in thy name forever.

MLK: History is the long and tragic story of the fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture, but groups are more immoral than invidividuals.

7 My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment;

MLK: Frankly, I have never yet engaged in a direct action movement that was “well-timed”, according to the timetable of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word “Wait!” It rings in the ear of every Negro with a piercing familiarity.

8 And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes.

MLK: We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights.

9 Thy friends do stand by thee, and they shall hail thee again with warm hearts and friendly hands.

MLK: The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward the goal of political independence, and we still creep at horse and buggy space toward the gaining of a cup of coffee at a lunch counter.

10 – 11 Thou art not yet as Job; thy friends do not contend against thee, neither charge thee with transgression, as they did Job. And they who do charge thee with transgression, their hope shall be blasted, and their prospects shall melt away as the hoar frost melteth before the burning rays of the rising sun;

MLK: You express a deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. One may well ask, “How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?” The answer is found in the fact that there are two types of laws: there are just and there are unjust laws. An unjust law is no law at all.

17 – 18 But those who cry transgression do it because they are the servants of sin, and are the children of disobedience themselves. And those who swear falsely against my servants, that they might bring them into bondage and death—

MLK: All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority, and the segregated a false sense of inferiority.

19 Woe unto them; because they have offended my little ones they shall be severed from the ordinances of mine house.

MLK: Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Isn’t segregation an existential expression of man’s tragic separation, an expression of his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? So I can urge men to disobey segregation ordinances because they are morally wrong.

33 How long can rolling waters remain impure? What power shall stay the heavens? As well might man stretch forth his puny arm to stop the Missouri river in its decreed course, or to turn it up stream, as to hinder the Almighty from pouring down knowledge from heaven upon the heads of the Latter-day Saints.

MLK: I had hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth of time. I received a letter this morning from a white brother in Texas which said: “All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but it is possible that you are in too great of a religious hurry. It has taken Christianity almost two thousand years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth.” All that is said here grows out of a tragic misconception of time. It is the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually time is neutral. It can be used either destructively or constructively.

34 Behold, there are many called, but few are chosen. And why are they not chosen?

MLK: I am coming to feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.

35 Because their hearts are set so much upon the things of this world, and aspire to the honors of men, that they do not learn this one lesson—

MLK: We must come to see that human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability. It comes through the tireless efforts and persistent work of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation.

36 That the rights of the priesthood are inseparably connected with the powers of heaven, and that the powers of heaven cannot be controlled nor handled only upon the principles of righteousness.

MLK: There was a time when the church was very powerful. It was during that period when the early Christians rejoiced when they were deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. Wherever the early Christians entered a town the power structure got disturbed and immediately sought to convict them for being “disturbers of the peace” and “outside agitators”. But they went on with the conviction that they were “a colony of heaven” and had to obey God rather than man. They were small in number but big in commitment.

37 That they may be conferred upon us, it is true; but when we undertake to cover our sins, or to gratify our pride, our vain ambition, or to exercise control or dominion or compulsion upon the souls of the children of men, in any degree of unrighteousness, behold, the heavens withdraw themselves; the Spirit of the Lord is grieved; and when it is withdrawn, Amen to the priesthood or the authority of that man.

MLK: But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If the church today does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authentic ring, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. I am meeting young people every day whose disappointment with the church has risen to outright disgust.

38 Behold, ere he is aware, he is left unto himself, to kick against the pricks, to persecute the saints, and to fight against God.

MLK: So the question is not whether we will be extremist but what kind of extremist will we be. Will we be extremists for hate or will we be extremists for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice – or will we be extremists for the cause of justice?

39 We have learned by sad experience that it is the nature and disposition of almost all men, as soon as they get a little authority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion.

MLK: We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.

40 Hence many are called, but few are chosen.

MLK: I guess I should have realized that few members of a race that has oppressed another race can understand or appreciate the deep groans and passionate yearnings of those that have been oppressed and still fewer have the vision to see that injustice must be rooted out by strong, persistent and determined action. I am thankful, however, that some of our white brothers have grasped the meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it. They are still too small in quantity, but they are big in quality.

41 No power or influence can or ought to be maintained by virtue of the priesthood, (but) only by persuasion, by long-suffering, by gentleness and meekness, and by love unfeigned;

MLK: There is the more excellent way of love and nonviolent protest. I’m grateful to God that, through the Negro church, the dimension of nonviolence entered our struggle. If this philosophy had not emerged, I am convinced that by now many streets of the South would be flowing with floods of blood.

42 By kindness, and pure knowledge, which shall greatly enlarge the soul without hypocrisy, and without guile-

MLK: The Negro has many pent-up resentments and latent frustrations. He has to get them out. So let him march sometime; let him have his prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; understand why he must have sit-ins and freedom rides. If his repressed emotions do not come out in these nonviolent ways, they will come out in ominous expressions of violence. This is not a threat; it is a fact of history. So I have not said to my people “get rid of your discontent”. But I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled through the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action.

43 Reproving betimes with sharpness, when moved upon by the Holy Ghost; and then showing forth afterwards an increase of love toward him whom thou hast reproved, lest he esteem thee to be his enemy;

MLK: I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the church. I say it as a minister of the gospel, who loves the church; who has been sustained by its spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of life shall lengthen. In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churches stand on the sideline and merely mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities. I have heard so many ministers say, “Those are social issues with which the Gospel has no real concern.” Over and over again I have found myself asking: “What kind of people worship here? Who is their God? Where were their voices of support when tired, bruised and weary Negro men and women decided to rise from the dark dungeons of complacency to the bright hills of creative protest?”

44 That he may know that thy faithfulness is stronger than the cords of death.

MLK: In deep disappointment, I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. Yes, I love the church; I love her sacred walls. How could I do otherwise? Yes, I see the church as the body of Christ. But, oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and fear of being nonconformists.

45 Let thy bowels also be full of charity towards all men, and to the household of faith, and let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly; then shall thy confidence wax strong in the presence of God; and the doctrine of the priesthood shall distil upon thy soul as the dews from heaven.

MLK: Maybe I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual church, the church within the church, as the true ecclesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom. They have gone through the highways of the South on tortuous rides. Yes, they have gone to jail with us. Some have been kicked out of their churches, and lost support of their bishops and fellow ministers.

46 The Holy Ghost shall be thy constant companion, and thy scepter an unchanging scepter of righteousness(justice) and truth (nonviolence); and thy dominion shall be an everlasting dominion, and without compulsory means it shall flow unto thee forever and ever.

MLK: But they have gone with the faith that right defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. These men have been the leaven in the lump of the race. Their witness has been the spiritual salt that has preserved the true meaning of the Gospel in these troubled times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of disappointment.

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Late-President Gordon B. Hinckley said of the temples, that ‘these unique and wonderful buildings, and the ordinances administered therein, represent the ultimate in our worship. These ordinances become the most profound expressions of our theology’. I have said elsewhere that too many members of the LDS church fail to see the rituals and the teachings we receive in the Temple as an elongated sermon on the mount.

Covenants are in Latter day Saints’ cultural understanding two-way binding agreements entered first through baptism by immersion at the age of eight and then gradually preparing members for the ‘more binding’ covenants made in temples. The covenants LDS make in the Temple intend on bringing the whole Church membership one by one under the obligation to strictly observe ‘instructions as set forth with great clarity and simplicity in the Doctrine and Covenants. These laws and ordinances are’, as Hugh Nibley puts it, ‘absolutely essential for the building up of the Kingdom of God on Earth and the ultimate establishment of Zion’.

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This covenant-spirituality, reinforced ritually and symbolically, in the context of God’s plan of salvation in temple ceremonies enacted or shown visually through film – also depicting Lucifer’s active opposition to that plan - has the potential of creating a new social reality for members of the Church and provide them with the necessary peacebuilding tools (as found in the Doctrines and Covenants) to affront violences in all their divers ways and means (cultural-structural-direct). In a way, LDS temple-goers covenant to become and act in the latter days as ‘saviors on Mount Zion’ – as mormon peacemakers, peacebuilders and peaceworkers.

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Prisoners are set free

In connection with the announcement of the building of the Rexburg Idaho Temple, John H. Groberg, an emeritus general authority of the LDS church, explains in the Importance of Temples, that ‘if we listen and obey, the temple will help us achieve the power of purity needed to be part of Zion. In the temple, prisoners are set free. Think of the bondage of sin. Think of the bondage of pride. Think of the bondage of fear. Think of being prisoners to uncertainty or a lack of self-confidence. Through the temple, in the process of time, and by the grace of the Savior, we can become free from these debilitating things. Go to the temple and be set free and help set others free’.

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But there are many other structures of injustice or of sin/violence in the world today that were not directly addressed by John H. Groberg, and also these structures must come down (1 Nephi 11:35-36). Pope John Paul II in Sollicitudo Rei Socialis calls unjust structures “structures of sin.”  They begin as sins committed by individual persons.  They are introduced into the society and reinforced again and again. Desire for profit and thirst for power keep them in place.  Soon they are taken for granted by most people.  They become self-perpetuating structures of sin.  They can be blamed on selfishness, bad political decisions, or irresponsible economic decisions.  They are all sin and are at the root of the evils that afflict the world today.

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Justice and charity intertwined

Groberg affirms that ‘charity is the pure love of Christ, which [..] means unselfish service given to help others. Charity never fails and has no end’. He wonders ‘if selfishness, even more than money, is the root of all evil and unselfishness the root of all good. When we do selfish things, bad things follow. When we do unselfish things, good things follow’. On the other hand, Pope Pius XI in Divini Redemptori explains that ‘charity will never be true charity unless it takes justice into account. Let no one attempt with small gifts of charity to exempt themselves from the great duties imposed by justice’.

Works of justice and works of charity are therefore intricately intertwined. LDS actually argue that the ordinance of baptism for the dead was revealed in order to meet the demands of justice, so that God, as well as being a merciful God could also be a just God (Alma 42:15). Groberg further believes that, ‘the Savior is the most unselfish person that ever lived on this earth. His whole life was about helping others, not Himself – and that is why the Savior invites us to follow Him and live the life of unselfishness. Since everything about the temple is based upon the life and mission of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, it follows that the work in the temple is based on unselfish service and is the basis of all good. The power of heaven flows to Earth through the temples and the ordinances and covenants made therein. Our desires to live clean lives, perform unselfish acts, be good neighbors, and become more Christ-like individuals are all enhanced through temple service’.

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a place of learning – holistic peace education

Leo Tolstoy explains in The Kingdom of God is within you that ‘the fulfillment of the teaching [of Christ] lies only in unceasing progress toward the attainment of ever higher and higher truth, and in an ever greater realization of this, in oneself by means of ever increasing love, and outside oneself by the more and more complete establishment of the Kingdom of God’. Holistic Peace Education (HoPE), as taught by The American Montessori Society, ‘begins with the embryonic environment where the children, through the delicate nurturing of adults, come in touch with their inner peace and learn to relate harmoniously with others’. Now replace children with Latter day Saints, and adults with temple workers:

In the temple, HoPE begins with the embryonic environment where members, through the delicate nurturing of temple workers, come in touch with their inner peace and learn to relate harmoniously with others. From this micro experience the [members] will, hopefully, have the tools and understanding to be able to accept and relate harmoniously to all people and their earthly environment. Holistic Peace Education is educating the “life within” the [member] and assisting them in learning how to relate harmoniously to the “life without.”

In fact, LDS members believe temple ceremonies are connected to the most-quoted millennial scripture in the peace movement: “And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways and we will walk in his paths; [..] and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore”.

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Groberg suggests that because ‘we live in the last days some may wonder when the Lord is going to come. I don’t know exactly when, but I personally think the Lord will come when enough good people have been to the temple, received their endowment, had their families sealed, filled their lives with light and then filled enough of the earth with that same light so that the world will be able to stay in one piece when He does come with His brilliant light. Can you see why the Lord has asked that we build temples all over the world?’

In Women as Peacemakers, Elizabeth Ferris explains that ‘women suffer disproportionately from the effects of militarized economies in which governments choose to devote scarce resources to arms and wars. When a government shifts money from education to military spending, more women than men lose teaching jobs, while more men than women gain jobs in the military sector. Women and children suffer the most from the economic and social consequences of military spending and foreign debt. Wars have other consequences for women. There is considerable evidence that men who return from wars are more likely to be violent towards their wives. As one author writes, ‘militarism and violence against women are inextricably linked. Military spending not only creates an economic injustice for women, it supports the ethic of violence against women’. 

In addition, awareness is growing that violence against women in armed conflicts is often a conscious policy, not an incidental by-product. Rape and sexual intimidation are common features of war in all societies. Rape and war go hand in hand.Rape, when used as a weapon of war, is systematically employed for a variety of purposes, including intimidation, humiliation, political terror, extracting information, rewarding soldiers, and “ethnic cleansing”. The consequences for victims of sexual violence in war are grave and may affect women for the rest of their lives. These include serious and chronic medical problems, psychological damage, life-threatening diseases such as HIV/AIDS, forced pregnancy, infertility, stigmatization and/or rejection by family members and communities.

250 000 women are believed having been raped in the war in the DRC

Julie Beck, as President of the Relief Society, is aware of the harsh conditions under which the women of the church are called to do God’s work. She explains: ‘the greatest and most important work for the women of this Church still lies ahead. The earth must be prepared to receive the Lord Jesus Christ, and we must help with this preparation in the midst of wars, turmoil, natural calamities, and an increase of evil. There has not been a time in the history of the world when a full-scale relief effort was more needed. Because we are disciples of Jesus Christ and we have made covenants with Him, we are already committed by covenant to participate in that relief effort’.

Elizabeth Ferris further explains however that ‘in some cultures beating of wives and children is an accepted tradition’. In fact, in most cultures, violence against women is not openly discussed or acknowledged. Rather it is kept undercover by a tradition that a “man’s home is his castle”, and as head of the household what he does in his home is of concern only to him and his family, not to the community. ‘Men get away with beating their wives and girl-friends because they believe that it is men’s right to own and control women’.

Traditionally, women are believed to be care-givers with the ‘nurturing gift of motherhood’, and are thought to have a potential motivation to speak up against war because of their maternal thinking. It is true that maternal roles of resolving conflicts within families, reconciling differences and of naming and challenging threats to their children create a certain predisposition towards working for peace and using nonviolence. More than 60 percent of the participants in the Salt March organized by Gandhi in April 1930 were women for example; and of the 30 000 people arrested, 17 000 were women. Gandhi himself saw women as offering the best hope for the practice of nonviolence.

Women activists wait at the starting line during the "Follow the Women - Women for Peace" ride in the southern port city of Sidon, Lebanon on April 10, 2007. Some 350 women activists from 35 countries kicked off a 12-day bicycle ride Saturday in northern Syria and then transferred to Lebanon to highlight the suffering of Arab women in the Middle East.

One must be aware of one thing however, that nonviolence advocates have been criticized in the past for any practice of nonviolence which does not include a commitment to women’s issues: ‘any commitment to nonviolence which is real, which is authentic, must begin in the recognition of the forms and degrees of violence perpetuated by men against women. Any analysis of violence, or any commitment to act against it, that does not begin there is hollow and meaningless. Any male apostle of so-called nonviolence which is not committed, body and soul, to ending violence against women is not trustworthy’. So a latter day satyagraha is naturally concerned with the position and situation of women within the LDS movement and is committed to end violence (direct-structural-cultural) against women in the Church and outside of it. Relief Society, on the lds.org website, lists three different objectives for the LDS women’s movement that may represent a starting point for a latter day satyagraha:

1. increase faith and personal righteousness (cultural peace)

2. strengthen families and homes (structural peace)

3. serve the lord and his children (direct peace)

Unfortunately, maternal thinking and maternal roles do not necessarily lead to defiant actions against oppressive governments (both political, ecclesiastical and familial). Women often organize or are organized in support of the status quo. Many leaders are conscious that ‘when women mobilize as mothers on behalf of their families, they become a potent political force’, but one as adaptable to repressive as to liberating causes. Not all women’s groups espouse progressive agendas.

why dismantle patriarchy

Ferris reports that ‘while some Chilean women’s groups organized for democracy and for life in the 70s, the network of women’s organizations created to support the military dictatorship of General Pinochet evolved to encompass an estimated 2 million women in the ten years between 1973 and 1983. For this reason, some women’s rights advocates are critical of building a peace movement solely on women’s identity as mothers. Women play many roles in society and justifications based on biology reinforce patriarchy. They also suggest that linking maternal values to peace-making absolves men of their equal responsibility to value and protect life’. This we will address in a separate article on ‘priesthood responsibilities’. 

Julie Beck reminds her sisters in the faith of President Hinckley’s plea to [women of the church]: ‘We have a greater challenge than we realize. ‘Do the best you can’. But I want to emphasize that it be the very best. We are capable of doing so much better. We must get on our knees and plead with the Lord for help and strength and direction. We must then stand on our feet and move forward.’ Julie Beck testifies that ‘our prophet has said that there is a better way than the way of the world. He has called uponthe women of the Church to stand together for righteousness. He has said that if we are united and speak with one voice, our strength will be incalculable’. I have expressed to him my confidence that the women of this Church will stand strong and immovable in our faith in Jesus Christ and His restored gospel (cultural peace); strong and immovable in upholding, nourishing, and protecting our families (structural peace); and strong and immovable in providing relief (direct peace)’.

ODM women supporters carry posters and shout slogans against the government as they march to the city centre, Nairobi, Kenya, Thursday, Jan. 10, 2008. Kenyans mobilized to demand the truth in their deadly dispute over presidential elections, with hundreds of women in the peace march yelling "No peace, no justice!"

In the Book of Moses, revealed to Joseph Smith in 1830 as part of his revision of the Bible, we learn of the prophet Enoch, who was called to preach repentance to his people (social transformation). He ultimately does such a good job that the people are called Zion – the pure in heart – and are translated into heaven. Then Enoch in his conversations with God has an experience that shocks and amazes him and completely changes his concept of God: It came to pass that the God of heaven looked upon the residue of the people and he wept; Enoch asks God in amazement: How it is thou canst weep, seeing thou art holy, and from all eternity to all eternity?

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The answer to Enoch’s questions reveal a concept of God, which Eugene England believes, is the essential foundation of all Mormon theology, one that makes Mormon theology radically different from most others. God’s power to remove sin (man’s inhumanity towards man and woman) and other causes of human suffering is limited. He can send prophets like Enoch to warn and preach repentance, and he can send his son to provide those who accept him with power to repent.

The apostle Neal A. Maxwell in his Ensign article Remember how merciful the Lord hath been explains that there is scriptural evidence of ‘touching lamentation from long-suffering Jesus’ for those whose choice is to reject him and what he offers: (1) is the imagery of Christ’s desire to gather God’s children as a hen gathers her chicks, and (2) the metaphor of the attentive and vigilant lord of the vineyard, who saddened by a disappointing harvest asks what more he could have done.

According to England, the weeping God of Mormon finitism creates a world for soul-building, which can only succeed if it includes exposure of our souls to the effects of natural law, as well as maximum latitude for us to exercise our agency as we learn how that universe works. Evil is a natural condition of such a world, not because God creates evil for soul building, but because evil inevitably results from agency fred to grapple with natural law in this mortal world.

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Exaltation is a corporate venture – nobody is saved alone

But behold, they have not learned to be obedient to the things which I required at their hands, but are full of manner of evil, and do not impart of their substance, as becometh saints, to the poor and afflicted among them; and are not united according to the union required by the law of the celestial kingdom. And my people must needs be chastened until they learn obedience, if it must needs be, by the things which they suffer (Doctrine and Covenants 105:2-4,6).

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Douglas Davies in Introduction to Mormonism argues that the ‘entire LDS theory of the individual within the total cosmos can be viewed as one of developmental shift from eternal intelligence, to personalized intelligence as a spirit child of God the Father, then as a human being and then as a resurrected being. Throughout this progression, the self is increasingly engaged in growing numbers of symbiotic relationships and responsibilities. The Mormon self must therefore be understood as interplay of community and agency: the self is more relational than essential despite the eternal nature of underlying intelligence’.

Davies believes that, in one sense, ‘it is easy to argue that Mormonism is radically individualistic, given its strong emphasis upon individual responsibility in the process of attaining salvation, but that would be a mistake because, as vital as that personal responsibility is, and as much as it may be advocated by church leaders, it demands a community of endeavour to achieve its goal. On the relational front, it is absolutely fundamental to appreciate that even a person’s ultimate salvation depends upon his or her relationship to someone else. It was common for early Mormon leaders to stress that nobody is ‘saved’ alone. Indeed, this is a distinctive feature of LDS theology – for exaltation is a corporate venture’.

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The Zion formula

And the Lord called his people ZION; because they were of one heart and one mind, and dwelt in righteousness; and there was no poor among them (Moses 7:18). ZION involves a dynamic change or transformation of heart (A), mind (C) and behavior (B). ZION may be seen as a context within which certain things can happen in a particular way, as for example the test of the marriage is when the going gets rough; the test of ZION is in the ability to practice our free agency in order to bless others.

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‘Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice (one mind); say that I was a drum major for peace (one heart); I was a drum major for righteousness (good deeds). And all of the other shallow things will not matter. I won’t have any money to leave behind. I won’t have the fine and luxurious things of life to leave behind. But I just want to leave a committed life behind. And that’s all I want to say’ (Martin Luther King, jr. 1968)

Gustavo Gutierrez defines theology as “critical reflection on historical praxis.” Doing theology requires the theologian to be immersed in his or her own intellectual and sociopolitical history. Theology is not a system of timeless truths, engaging the theologian in the repetitious process of systematization and apologetic argumentation. Theology is a dynamic, ongoing exercise involving contemporary insights into knowledge (epistemology), man (anthropology), and history (social analysis).

Douglas Davies in The Mormon Culture of Salvation argues that the LDS Church as a restoration movement exists because something is believed to have happened at a particular time and place, not just in the ancient lands of Biblical times, but also in the North and Meso-America of the Book of Mormon stories. More particularly still, it is thought that the young Joseph Smith was commissioned to establish the Church by divine beings. This conviction makes the sense of time and place quite palpable in Mormonism, to the extent that history and story telling within Mormonism often plays the role occupied in other religions by theology’.

Davies continues, ‘ the cultural investment in the significance of the restoration through the Prophet Joseph Smith has made the LDS preoccupation with history quite inevitable, paving the ground for a very specific reading of history. Combined with heroic accounts of past generations of believers and personal testimony, as well as accounts of the doings and prophetic statements of leaders comprise a complex scheme of knowledge in a LDS culture most often US-centric in nature, yet bound up with world historical denouements’. 

According to Gutierrez, “praxis” means more than the application of theological truth to a given situation. It means the discovery and the formation of theological truth out of a given historical situation through personal participation in the class struggle for a new egalitarian society. In Liberation Theology, biblical history is important insofar as it models and illustrates this quest for justice and human dignity. Israel’s liberation from Egypt in the Exodus and Jesus’ life and death stand out as the prototypes for the contemporary human struggle for liberation. We are taught by Nephi to use the ancient biblical stories for our own profit: And I did read many things unto them which were written in the books of Moses; but that I might more fully persuade them to believe in the Lord their Redeemer I did read unto them that which was written by the prophet Isaiah; for I did liken all the scriptures unto us, that it might be for our profit and learning (1 Nephi 19:23).

The current practice (and not “praxis”) within the LDS Church is to see ‘present Church growth and world expansion and certain other selected major world events, both preceding and following the Restoration – the Reformation, the US inspired constitution, Communism’s collapse, and America’s consequent perceived divine destiny to bring international peace and freedom to the world –  to be closely intertwined and to take on exclusive cosmic proportions’.

The question is now: on which side of history does the LDS Church stand today?

Liberation theologians agree with Marx’s famous statement: “Hitherto philosophers have explained the world; our task is to change it.” They argue that theologians are not meant to be theoreticians but practitioners engaged in the struggle to bring about society’s transformation (repentance on a large scale). In order to do this, liberation theology employs a Marxist-style class analysis, which divides society between oppressors and oppressed. This conflictual sociological analysis is meant to identify the injustices and exploitation within the historical situation. Marxism and liberation theology condemn religion for supporting the status quo and legitimating the power of the oppressor.

Saviors on Mount Zion

But unlike Marxism, liberation theology turns to the Christian faith as a means for bringing about liberation. Marx failed to see the emotive, symbolic, and sociological force the church could be in the struggle for justice. Which brings us today to a sort of cross-road for members of the Church in countries of the world, where there are unjust structures, where they live under the yoke of tyranny and corruption. Should they ask themselves if they should use the influence of the Church to accelerate the process of transformation of social structures? Gutierrez argues that the building of a just society (Zion-building) has worth in terms of building the Kingdom of God on earth and that to participate in the process of socio-political liberation in many countries is already, in a certain sense, a salvific work. And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered: for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance. (Joel 2:32)

The biblical notion of salvation is equated with the process of liberation from oppression and injustice. Sin is defined in terms of man’s inhumanity to others. Liberation theology for all practical purposes equates loving your neighbor with loving God. The two are not only inseparable but virtually indistinguishable. King Benjamin’s sermon  in the Book of Mormon explains that ‘when ye are in the service of your fellow beings, ye are only in the service of your God’ (Mosiah 2:17).