Word: priesthoods
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...country, the fact that a group of several thousand Negroes in Nigeria have asked for baptism in the church, and other outward signs would indicate to sensitive Mormons that the Lord is preparing the way for a change in the policy that excludes the Negro from the priesthood. Such a change would not, as your article stated, require "a most awkward reinterpretation of Mormon teaching on pre-existence." Christ, for reasons of his own, has excluded the Negro from his priesthood in our day, and a change in policy by revelation would not be surprising...
...revelation that the church is talking about with respect to the Negro and the priesthood should have been sought 50 years ago-not now when we are forced into looking for one. Even if a revelation should come now, we have compromised our position because it looks as if we have been forced into seeking it, which will be true...
Mormons believe that Negroes cannot become priests-although Mormons define most active male believers as priests. Non-Mormons are prone to infer from this that Mormons are segregationists. The church replies that it has a right to set the qualifications of its own priesthood, and that excluding Negroes is no more discriminatory than the refusal of many churches (including the Mormons) to ordain women...
Doubts about the Saints' stand on Negroes are widespread enough to challenge the presidential chances of Michigan's Mormon Governor George Romney, although Romney is a strong advocate of Negro civil rights. Many younger Mormons believe that the church has no choice but to open up the priesthood to the Negro. "The change will come, and within my lifetime," says Dr. J. D. Williams, 37, a professor of political science and former bishop of the Provo stake (diocese). "The Mormon liberal has for years felt a deep uneasiness over his church's doctrine that Negroes...
Robert Blair Kaiser studied ten years for the priesthood before becoming a journalist. Fluent in Latin, he was assigned by TIME to cover the Ecumenical Council of the Vatican in the fall of 1962, and his knowledgeable reporting won for him the 1963 Overseas Press Club award for the best magazine reporting on foreign affairs. Recently he took time off to write Pope, Council and World (Macmillan; $4.95). So that he could get the solitude he wanted, he checked in at the Roman College of an international missionary order, and there for six weeks wrote from 8 in the morning...