Jamie’s Blog

The other Sunday while listening to a Sister give her talk in church, my wife leaned over and whispered into my ear, ‘If I had to have a Sister Wife, I think I would want Sister XYZ.’ I was kinda taken aback. You see Sister XYZ is a single Sister and on top of that we have been watching more than our fair share of Big Love.

My wife often asks me “Would you want to have another wife?” I answer “Only if I could clone you.” or “I don’t think I could handle another wife.” and she replies smiling ”But I bet you would love to give it a good college try!”

Polygamy is a sore subject with some people these days. Maybe it’s because it is a male dominated role in this type of society. But being the egalitarian that I am, my view of Polygamy would be to have multiple partners, Half-Spouses¹². Both Ways, not just for men but for women also.

Could you handle a second spouse? Could your spouse handle a second spouse? So what do you think? Is real Polygamy³ a viable option for a relationship or is it just a strange way to cancel your Membership in the Church?

Jamie Trwth

1. Half-Wife = Second, Third, etc [↩]
2. Half-Husband = Second, Third, etc [↩]
3. Multipal Spouses for all [↩]

The first part of this book, in Personal insights From a Black Man in Zion, Marcus Martins states he was the first Black man to go on a full time mission after the ban was lifted. The foot notes read “Brother Elijah Able, a (member of the third quorum of the) seventy, was the first member with Black African ancestry to serve full-time missions for the Church in the nineteenth century”. If the Priesthood Ban was instituted in 1830, the first year the Church was established, then how did Brother Able become ordained an Elder in the Melchizedek Priesthood and also Ordained to the Office of Seventy? Marcus never explained the why he was ordained. Or if it was a problem in the Church.These are some of the questions I wanted answered in this book.

As I read further, he did answer a question regarding the Priesthood Ban. But the answer was neither official nor unofficial. It was his own hypothesis. And how we should not question God.

In my mind this book should have had a different title. It probably wouldn’t sell as many copies but it would have a true title like: “Blacks & the Mormon Priesthood: Don’t Question God“or “Blacks & the Mormon Priesthood: The Ban is now in the past (stop bringing it up already. . . gosh!)“.

There was one, out of many, off topic remark was made in the book. But this one shocked me to read:

“So if someone can’t bear the thought of being with me in eternity, he or she is welcome to head or another kingdom. ¹ In my research I have read many racist remarks made by church leaders and this statement in up there with the best. How dare he say that about others? How dare he say that? Oh, if you want to know the title of the next sub-chapter in the book:

“Dealing with Statements from the Past.”

And now we have a hateful statement from the present.

I really need to let the people in on something about Jamie Trwth. I read my first real novel  at the age of 25. Learning the eloquence and flow (for lack of better words) of the English language didn’t come easy for me. Being Diagnosed with learning disabilities when I was young and adult Attention Deficit Disorder in later years. But I didn’t go to college and partake in writing classes. And I really have to say that if I was to ever hand in a paper of this sort to any one of my professors I would have failed the course no questions asked. This book is one of the worst reads². If you were thinking about purchasing this book on the publishers website please think again. They didn’t even have it listed nor do they have an ecommerce site of their own. You are taken to another site to search for and purchase this book.

And like I said in the first post. . . . I was really disappointed with this book. . . on so many levels.

For real answers to your questions about the “Black Mormon Priesthood Ban” check out Blacks in the Scriptures or John Delihn’s Mormon Stories Podcast Episode #26 Blacks and the LDS Priesthood

Jamie Trwth

1. Page 27 Setting the Record Straight: Blacks & The Mormon Priesthood. [↩]
2. beside the ‘Preparing to Enter the Holy Temple‘ Booklet [↩]

It has almost been a year since I embarked on this journey of the Latter-day persuasion. At an 8 year old baptism I asked the father. . . “Your Daughter is set now.” “No. Now we just got to get her to the temple.”

This made me think about the times in Church when they give babies blessing. They always pray that they have children and marry in the Temple. Well, that got me to thinking. I know of women who can’t conceive children naturally or at all. And trying to conceived artificially is too expensive.

What if your child has a disability, or can’t breed. All their lives they have been told (if they grew up in the Church) about having a family of their own and marrying in the Temple.

Lets say for example that your daughter was born “Intersexed¹”. Statistics state that 1 in every 25,000 births have this condition. With these figures this means there are about 520 Intersexed people in the world wide Church and about 200 in the USA Church.

There are a select people with anomalies of the Church but where are their voices heard? Where do they fit into the plan?

1. Intersexuality is a term used to describe a person whose sex chromosomes, genitalia and/or secondary sex characteristics are determined to be neither exclusively male nor female. A person with intersex may have biological characteristics of both the male and female sexes. [↩]

Yesterday I frequented our local “Bountiful Book Store” to purchase some Boy Scout item for my son. As I was walking in I saw an advertisement for a new book series called “Setting The Record Straight”. This is a 5 part series sub-titled “The Book of Mormon”, “Mormons & Polygamy”, “Mormons & Masons”, ”Joseph Smith & The Mormon Prophet” and “Blacks & The Mormon Priesthood”. I thought I would purchase a couple of these titles to read but then I decided just to purchase the latter book. Just to give the series a chance to prove itself first.

As I read the jacket of “Blacks & The Mormon Priesthood” I thought to myself  “Gee. Maybe this book will help me understand a little more on this subject.” Boy was I wrong. I have not finished the book yet but from what I have read and the titles of some of the chapters and sub-chapters, I am in for a complete let-down.

The Jacket cover sold me . . .  an I think the book is going to sell me out.¹ Like I said, It sounded wonderful. The author is a man of African Descent who He holds a PhD. and was a member of the Church² before the 1978 Revelation³.

So what went so wrong with it? Well the online snippet for this book reads:

The book answers the questions surrounding why male black members of the Church were banned from holding the priesthood.

The question was answered in the early part of this book: We don’t know. Was the answer.

Before I was a member of the Church my wife and I walked about this issue. She asked me “So, you think that someone in the Church knows why the ban was in place?” I told her “Yes. I do!” But what I was really thinking was . . . . they are a billion dollar corporation. Of Course someone knows why. They keep statistic about everything under the sun and under the Sunstone. These people who know about this issue are keeping it silent.

If you remember in the movie “Independence Day” when the president didn’t know about the alien space craft that ‘his’ government had in a lab. The leaders of the Church are not the keepers of the Arc. However there are people in the Church whose whole mission is to keep the “secrets” of the Church. The Keepers of the Vault.

On just about every subject he brought up, the answer to the question was. . . . . We don’t know.

Let me give you an example. The first sub-chapter of the book is titled: The Priesthood Ban: What We Don’t Know for Sure—or Not at All.

More to come . . . .  .

Jamie Trwth

1. First I must tell you that the jacket of a book is not normally written by the author. It is written by someone who writes book jacket covers. The more books sold for this individual, the more books they will write for. [↩]
2. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints [↩]
3. The 1978 Revelation extended the priesthood to all worthy male. Ones this African Blood. [↩]