Re: Big Love season 3
Quote:
Can someone smarter than me run down the deal with the letter?
Is this letter mean that the church was still ok with polygamy but was going to sweep it under the rug?
What does this have to do with Bill and his family? |
OK, Wilford Woodruff was the prophet of the mormon church in the late 1800s. When Utah was coming into the union, there was a lot of negative thought and persecution of mormons for their practice of polygamy. Prophet Joseph Smith (founder) had been a polygamist, and it was fairly common practice. On September 24, 1890, Woodruff ended the support of the church for Polygamy... because without doing so, the feds had basically said they'd declare mormonism a cult and crush them.
HOWEVER, amongst polygamist circles, it has long been said that Woodruff was pressured by the US Government, and he had written a letter to the leader of many of the churches steeped in polygamy and informed them that it was not the will of God for them to be punished for their practice, and if sometime in the future mormonism could grow and show it's way as healthy and the word of God, then polygamy would return.
The "Woodruff letter" is insanely sought after by the Church of Mormon, who at times has been duped into buying historical documents.
In came back into prominence when famed 1980s forger Mark Hoffman managed to come up with the entirely fictitious "Salamander Letter" and inspire a semi-bidding war at one point over the quest to get the "Woodruff Letter to the Disciples".
The letter never came up. But it is a real sticking point of those who believe in religiously ordained polygamy; if it did exist, it would validate that their lifestyle is not just "OK" with God, but seen as a prominent positive lifestyle within the church.
IF it was found, for people like Barb, who believe but question, it would be the same as saying "your instinct was right all along, you are doing the RIGHT thing."
The Woodruff Letter has never been produced by anyone, so it's more a myth then any reality.