Religious Bigotry

Last week, just before the election, a group seeking to defeat the Marriage Initiative in California, Prop 8, ran an advertisement on many television stations which showed two LDS missionaries as Gestapo-like thugs invading the house of a "same-sex couple" and searching it, then finding and destroying their "marriage license" in front of them; and then talking about what other freedoms they (the LDS people) would be able to steal.

The actual political issue aside (this is not the time or place to discuss same-sex "marriage," this ad is nearly unbelievable, and reminded me of a time back in Missouri and Illinois, back in the 1830s and specifically 1838, when the spiritual ancestors of the LDS missionaries so defamed in the ad were similarly defamed and condemned, to the point that the elected governor of the State of Missouri, Lilburn Boggs, issued the horrifying "Extermination Order."

Acting at the outcry of a part of the public against their neighbor's religious and social practices, the State of Missouri not only acted on this Executive Order 44, but conducted military tribunals and sentenced several of the leaders of the Latter-Day Saints [Mormons] to death by firing squad; a sentence not carried out only because a brave officer defied the orders of his military and civilian superiors and refused to carry out the sentence. Apparently as many as 60 men could have been executed (murdered) on 1 November 1838, in Far West, Missouri (now part of Kansas City, Missouri) but for the determination of one soldier not to violate his oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States and of the State of Missouri.

Even so, this religious bigotry, this hatred and anger and fear and loathing of a group simply trying to practice their religious convictions, resulted in a good many "lesser" evil deeds: the wholesale looting of their towns and farms, the killing of their livestock and pets, the house-to-house search and seizure of weapons, and the rape of many of those who were women. All by "good Americans" who did not want to listen (or allow anyone else to listen to) the LDS's version of the Gospel.

It was an evil day, an evil period - and Missouri did not even rescind the wicked Extermination Order until 1976, with "regrets." No restitution, no amends, just "regrets."

The homosexual activists who paid for the production and airing of that ad do not claim, yet, to represent the State of California or any jurisdiction thereof. Those homosexual "marriage" activists who, since Prop 8 passed, have threatened to burn church buildings, burn homes, and stab, beat, and otherwise wound, maim, or kill supporters of the Yes on Prop 8 effort, AND anyone belonging to any church which did not come out in favor of homosexual "marriage" do not yet have the sanction of the State of California. Not yet. But as in Canada, Sweden, and elsewhere, they seek such sanction, by outlawing the right of the REAL LDS missionaries (not the thugs portrayed in the commercial) to speak and teach their beliefs regarding homosexuality, marriage, and the family. Will we see such an "Extermination Order" signed by some future successor of the Terminator?