LDS to push marriage amendment
The Deseret News ^ | 5-27-2006 | Elaine Jarvik

Posted on 05/27/2006 8:00:47 AM PDT by Utah Girl

Voice your support for a federal marriage amendment, the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints urges in a letter to be read in LDS sacrament meetings Sunday.

The letter, sent to priesthood leaders in the United States, calls on Latter-day Saints to contact their senators to support a resolution calling for a constitutional amendment that would limit lawful marriages to those between a man and a woman.

To further spell out its opposition to same-sex marriages, the amendment states that: "Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman."

A Senate vote on the resolution is expected the week of June 5. A previous vote failed in the Senate but passed the House. Any future amendment would require approval by two-thirds of Congress and three-fourths of the states.

The LDS Church posted its letter to priesthood leaders on its Web site, but its communications office declined to comment further.

"We, as the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, have repeatedly set forth our position that the marriage of a man and a woman is the only acceptable marriage relationship," the letter reads.

"Disappointing," says openly gay state Sen. Scott McCoy about the letter. "It's no surprise as to what the church's position is on same-sex marriage and the amendment," says McCoy, D-Salt Lake. "But I find it disappointing that the church is being drawn into what is nothing more than election year grandstanding on the part of the Republican Party. It's an attempt to distract voters from the total mismanagement of the country they've been responsible for in the past two years."

News of the letter was received with a "Great!" at the conservative, Colorado-based Focus on the Family. "The timing is wonderful," says Peter Brandt, senior director of public policy. Focus on the Family has sent out its own letter to 135,000 U.S. pastors, offering them pre-printed postcards in support of the amendment. "We've distributed a million or so postcards," Brandt says. The group has also launched phone campaigns in 14 states where Senate members voted against the amendment the last time. Utah is not on the list.

Religious groups are also lining up for and against the proposed amendment.

A coalition calling itself Clergy for Fairness is campaigning against it. Among its members are leaders of Reformed Judaism, the Episcopal Church, the United Methodist Church and the United Church of Christ. These denominations and their seminaries have been completely overthrown by a cabal of Gays Lesbians Humanists, Agnostics and Atheists. They have gone out in a concerted effort to silence their strongest critics. And in the church with its structure of pastors and elders and boards an extreme minority can have absolute control. And by playing the these churches guilt and sin they can easily alter doctrine to suit their cause.

Last month the LDS Church officially signed on to another letter, written on behalf of the Religious Coalition for Marriage, that called for a national marriage amendment. Elder Russell M. Nelson, a member of the church's Quorum of the Twelve, signed the letter along with 49 other religious leaders (As opposed to entire deominations) from around the country.
The denominations even in fundamentalist Pentecostal and charismatic circles are terrified to stand up against the gay lobby for fear they will be branded cold and uncaring. And because there is none among them that are Preachers of Righteousness -- preaching of Sin Righteousness and the Judgment -- they have been greatly weakened and have become susceptible to every perversion that men can speak with flattering words. Who is it among these that has been given an eye to see, even the Spirit of discernment as what is to come and befall them? For it would, they would wake in the night quaking with terror for their own souls and the souls of those who hear them.

In 2004, two-thirds of Utah voters passed a state version of the marriage amendment, which changed the Utah Constitution to specifically ban gay marriages. Four months earlier, the First Presidency of the LDS Church issued a brief statement saying that the church "favors a constitutional amendment preserving marriage as the lawful union of a man and a woman."

While I have a rather low opinion of the LDS and their following the perversions of Joseph Smith and his Golden Bible – it appears that some of their leaders will fare quite better than the leaders of many of the so-called mainstream church’s denominations in the day of Judgment.

And as I have commented elsewhere for the last three decades the LDS has been making a concerted effort to clean themselves up both doctrinally and morally. And perhaps the day will come when they will cast aside their Book of Mormon and what remains of their Book of The Pearl of Great Price. And in that hour it may be that they will shine before the Lord beyond all in the so-called mainstream church.