Vatican directs bishops to keep parish records from Mormons

  • Thread starter Thread starter UtahMaggie
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
One thing a little ironic: It’s only one heartbeat beyond a good idea because if you could back up just that one heartbeat, then it would be baptism in danger of death.
 
I say seal the records shut, convert every Mormon we can get our hands on and call it a day!
 
I’ll be honest. I am very pleased with this decision. For the Mormons to go baptizing the dead is very disrespectful if you ask me.
 
kristie_m said:
Perhaps, but an invalid baptism just the same.
Click to expand...
…if it can even be called a “baptism”. The CCC says our Baptism leaves an indelible mark on the soul - that’s something neither we nor God can change (we need to find out where the Mormons are buying their erasers).
:)
 
NeedImprovement;3678313 (we need to find out where the Mormons are buying their erasers). said:
:rotfl: :rotfl:

I bet it’s that super “Mr. Clean” magic sponge!! 😛 Takes crayon marks off the walls and phony baptisms off the soul!
Click to expand...
 
I was very grateful to see this action by the Church.

This ‘proxy baptism’ has been very hurtful to many, including Catholics. It’s disrespectful, at best, and desecrates the memories of our loved ones, at worst.

If the Mormons were using this information for genealogical purposes only, that would be fine. But, that’s not what they do. They sneak (and yes, I mean sneak) around culling names from public records, parish registeries, cemeteries, and con people into entering the names of their loved ones into databases on their genealogical sites, under the guise of genealogy research, without disclosing the fact that the names entered will be used by the Mormon church for their temple ordinances. That’s dishonest.

Their goal is to ‘baptise’ everyone in the world, despite objections by people of other faiths. It’s common knowledge they’ve gone after Holocaust victims. What’s less known is the fact that they’ve ‘baptised’ Catholic saints and Popes. I found JPII’s name entered three times, shortly after his death. I also found Mother Teresa’s name. They had used her birth name.

And, much to my horror, I found my own parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents entered into the IGI database. Devout Catholics, all. It broke my heart.

I wrote to Fr. Massa, Executive Director, Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, and thanked him for pursuing this issue, and taking a stand to protect our dead. He wrote back and told me I was the first to express gratitude for this work. Please, write to Fr. Massa and let him know you appreciate the efforts he and others have put forth.

His email is public. jmassa@usccb.org
 
This has really caused an uproar here in Utah. If you go to KSL.com or sltrib.com and search for Vatican, you will find many comments on this subject. One of the most popular by the mormons is that if the Catholic church doesn’t want it’s members baptized posthumously then they must believe the mormon church is the true church. And of course, there is the ever popular “What harm is it doing?” Many mormons are very upset believing they can never get their Catholic ancestors information. As Msgr. Fitzgerald stated, the Catholic church here in Utah has never given the baptism records to the mormon church. But if an individual wants their ancesors information, they can get it.

My own opinion is that the mormons here in Utah are so used to getting whatever they want, that when they are told “no” they don’t know how to handle it. Gosh it’s so fun being Catholic in Utah, right Mapi? 😉

Maggie
 
And they shouldn’t! It’s none of their bloody business! Why don’t we go after some of their records, so that they can get a dose of their own medicine!
 
UtahMaggie said:
This has really caused an uproar here in Utah.
Click to expand...
I think most people don’t know this is happening. The Mormons certainly aren’t forthcoming with the information. It’s not explained on the genealogy websites. It’s a dishonest practice and needs to stop.

I’d like to mention one other thing. Most people think the Mormon religion is just another denomination of Christianity. It’s not. It’s a completely different religion. Their doctrine and beliefs are radically different from traditional beliefs Christians have held for 2000 years. The idea of posthumous baptising is just one of many beliefs peculiar to that religion. However, it is one that affects us and the memories of our faithfully departed.

For Catholics to accept this religion as just another of our separated brethern, we’d have to renounce our beliefs. I’m not sure most people realize that.
 
geoSue said:
From a site I use posted today on this issue. I do genealogy and their files though not always accurate sue have been a help to me. I found old German church records that led me to my family in Germany

Kimberly’s Genealogy Blog
From Kimberly Powell,
Your Guide to Genealogy.
FREE Newsletter. Sign Up Now!
Vatican Orders Catholic Parish Registers Off-Limits to LDS Church
A recent letter issued by the Vatican Congregation for Clergy directs Roman Catholic dioceses worldwide to keep The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from “microfilming and digitizing information” contained in Catholic sacramental registers, according to a report in the Catholic News Service. The reason give for the move is to prevent LDS Church members from using the records to posthumously baptize Catholic ancestors by proxy.
The Vatican directive says the purpose of the policy is to:

"ensure that such a detrimental practice is not permitted in [each bishop’s] territory, due to the confidentiality of the faithful and so as not to cooperate with the erroneous practices of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints."One of the core tenets of Mormon faith is that the dead can be baptized into the Church to offer them the opportunity to accept the faith in an afterlife and achieve salvation. Many Jews and Christians have been upset by this practice, and see it as usurping the memory of their departed relatives. Some of this has been due to such names appearing in the International Genealogical Index (IGI) which does include the records of temple work submitted by member of the LDS Church, but also includes names extracted from civil records as part of a Records Extraction Project. In other words, just because a name is in the IGI, doesn’t mean the individual was baptized into the Latter-day Saints faith after their death, although stories such as Will Pope Benedict become a Mormon after he dies? seem to appear in the news media fairly regularly. Ironically, the Vatican Offices of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith declared in June 2001 that baptism conferred by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is not valid. The response was signed by the prefect, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — now Pope Benedict XVI.

I’m often asked if I’m a Mormon when people first learn of my interest in genealogy, but in actuality I’m a Catholic - and on just about every branch of my family tree. I just spent some time this week researching some of my French Catholic ancestors in 17th century parish registers - online, of course! I can’t even begin to imagine how long this research would have otherwise taken trying to compose letters in French to request copies of baptism and marriage records for which I did not have an exact date. Without those Catholic parish registers there would have been few, if any, surviving records available to help me piece together my family tree.

The LDS Church has microfilmed millions of pages of parish registers from all over the world – many of them from Catholic parishes. In doing so, they preserve these valuable records for future generations, and make them available to people all over the world - people of all faiths and beliefs. Restricting access to these records by the Latter-day Saints hurts everyone, and possibly even denies the Catholic church part of its own heritage as unfilmed records are lost to decay, flood or fire. As David M. Bresnahan so eloquently stated in his article Genealogists Need Catholic Records to Find Ancestors - Families Have Right to Family History, “Hopefully Mormons, Catholics, and genealogists of all faiths can unite in prayer that those who are responsible for this decision will reconsider, particularly as the consequences of this policy become manifest.”
Click to expand...
I agree with you. I have been working on family geneology for many years, have one side of the family back to 1400 all with the help, many times, of the LDS records. One parish church where records were kept had a fire and most of the records were lost. It would have been nice to have them preserved in some way and accessible. Other point is, our Catholic ancestors have already been baptized. All the rebaptisms in the world will not change that. It is an effort in futility as we all know.
 
Genealogy is a passion/hobby of mine. I have to say that I have discovered alot of family information through www.familysearch.org. which is the Latter Day Saints Genealogy website. If they are doing this for the purpose of re-baptising my ancestors, while it may be annoying a bit kooky in my opinion, I don’t see where they hold any power to authentically do so. I am not concerned.
 
Maggie:

We don’t have to renounce anything! They (the Mormons) need to respect our heritage and our rights. If it’s a turf war they want, they’ll get it and we will fight until the last Catholic is standing to make our point!
 
I used to be upset at this, until I realized that the mormons are not christians. They believe that God was once a man like us and became a god. So, their “baptisms” are fake and are fantasies.

John
 
It would be fine to keep the records from the LDS but for the fact that the US Census already has the names of most probably almost all Americans and they can “re-baptize” using other sources. This is true for other countries as well.

The people this affects the most are people like me who want to know where in Europe their ancestors came from. It is not like the Catholic bishops have uniformly made these records available to the public even our own members. NY is especially difficult to research.

My local LDS family history lady(a fallen away Catholic) says that they do not re-baptize anymore because of the complaints especially from Jews. On a family by family basis yes but not a register of names at one time. For a deceased Jew to be baptized, the LDS member MUST substantiate the relationship.

I guess it annoys me that the beliefs of a recent sect are affecting my ability to access the names and places those sacramental records could provide. I can live without knowing these names but will the gates of Hell have prevailed if I learned the maiden name of Mrs. Patrick(Catherine) McGuigan/Goodwin(1815-1867)?

Lastly, since the baptisms are invalid it has no affect. I can see it is offensive but we know that St. Francis of Assisi is safe in heaven and no LDS baptism can get him removed from heaven.
 
They really do need to stay away and leave our traditions alone or that little thing called the Counter Reformation will look like a fist fight! 👍 👍
 
UtahMaggie said:
One of the most popular by the mormons is that if the Catholic church doesn’t want it’s members baptized posthumously then they must believe the mormon church is the true church.
Maggie
Click to expand...
Say WHAT??? If we thought Mormonism WAS the True Chruch, secretly or not, why in the world we object???

The only reason anyone in his/her right mind would object is if we believed Mormonism is a FALSE church (which is exactly what we DO believe).
CreosMary said:
Is this a sneaky way for the mormons to up thier numbers?
hey look, we have 15 billion mormons now…really!
Click to expand...
I think you hit on something here. Mormons add to their membership rolls pretty readily, but they never seem to purge them.

Since Mormons also claim that they tithe a substantial percent, I wonder what all these Ghost Mormons do to the “average tithe per member” statistic. It must be quite a burden on the active members to keep the percentages up.
 
What harm will the “baptisms” seriously do. They aren’t valid.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top