• New website from Mormon church: 'Sexuality is not a choice'

    A screenshot of the new website, mormonsandgays.org.

    By Andrew Mach, Staff Writer, NBC News

    The Mormon Church has launched a new website in an attempt to "encourage understanding" with gays and lesbians, an effort heralded by activists as a departure from the church's perceived hostility toward the LGBT community.



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    Presented as a “collection of conversations” with LDS leaders and Mormons “who are attracted to people of the same sex,” the website, mormonsandgays.org, launched Thursday.

    The site includes an unusual statement for a major religious body: that sexuality, including same-sex attraction, is not a personal choice. But it maintains that acting on that attraction is still a "sin."

    “What we do know is that the doctrine of the church – that sexual activity should only occur between a man and a woman who are married – has not changed and is not changing,” Elder Quentin Cook said in statement announcing the site's launch. “But what is changing and what needs to change is to help our own members and families understand how to deal with same-gender attraction.”

    The website, which a spokesman said has been in production for more than two years, features a number of videos from top church leaders and gay and straight lay Mormons, who share their experiences counseling Mormons who suffer from AIDS and advising Mormon parents not to reject children who pursue a gay lifestyle. 

    The development of the site was launched only a short time after the Mormon Church encouraged its members to get involved in the high-profile fight over Proposition 8 -- a ban on gay marriage -- in California in 2008. 

    The church, which was blasted by the LGBT community at the time, has since ended directives that Latter-Day Saints should oppose civil rights for gay families. In 2009, it officially endorsed gay rights initiatives in Salt Lake City that stopped just short of civil unions or marriage.

    “On this website we witness something that church leaders rarely do: admit that we’ve done things wrong in the past. In light of this, the clear admission that things need to change is particularly welcome, if long overdue," Spencer Clark, executive director for Mormons for Marriage Equality, said in an email to NBC News.

    Public acceptance of gay marriage among all Americans has increased to record highs. A Gallup poll released Wednesday showed that 53 percent of Americans favor legalizing same-sex marriage.

    Year-to-year membership statistics for the Mormon church place it among the fastest-growing religions, with more than 5 million members in the U.S. and more than 14 million members worldwide, the church reported in early 2012. 

    Randall Thacker, president elect for Affirmation, an organization supporting gay and lesbian Mormons, said the site brings to surface the openness of the Mormon culture to adaptation.

    “The church is adaptable because we have a worldwide religion, which brings in people every day from all different perspectives and frames of reference, and so we have to be able to have a church membership that is ready for change,” Thacker told NBC News.

    For Clark, the website represents a turning point for his faith’s stance on homosexuality.

    “Too often, gay Mormons and their families have felt that they had to choose between their loyalty to each other and to their church,” Clark said. “Latter-Day Saints have often described gay individuals as ‘struggling with same-sex attraction’ without considering whether the true test from God was on those who are straight to see if they would struggle loving those who are gay. We simply can’t claim to love God, and not love the gay children, parents or neighbors that he has placed in our lives.”  

    Jim Dabakis, a former Mormon missionary and soon to be the only gay person in the state legislature, told the Salt Lake Tribune he’s thrilled with the new site.

    “I give tremendous credit to the LDS Church,” Dabakis said. “This can’t have been easy,” acknowledging ever-improving relations between the Mormon church and the gay community. 

    Clark said he believes the website will help heal deep-seated wounds.  

    “It is clear that church leaders have heard the voices and stories of so many Mormons who have been working to make things better for our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters, and I believe this will help open the door to even greater progress in the future.” 

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  • Mormon church restricts online access to Jewish names

    Al Hartmann / AP file

    Helen Radkey is a researcher who has publicized the LDS Church's proxy baptisms of Holocaust victims and Catholic Saints.

    By msnbc.com staff and news services

    SALT LAKE CITY -- Mormon leaders have put up a virtual firewall in their massive genealogical database to block out anyone who attempts to access the names of hundreds of thousands of Holocaust victims the church has agreed not to posthumously baptize.

    The move comes amid criticism that the Salt Lake City-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints hasn't done enough to live up to commitments to stop its members worldwide from performing the baptism ritual on Holocaust victims and other notable Jews.

    The new system will immediately block church members' access should they try to seek out names of Holocaust victims or other notable figures that have been flagged as not suitable for proxy baptisms. The church said the move is aimed at ending the practice.

    But critics say it merely serves to block anyone from monitoring whether the posthumous baptisms continue.

    "By not allowing public access to the records, it creates the illusion they have something to hide," said Jewish genealogist Gary Mokotoff, who was involved in negotiations with the church over ending the practice for the past two decades.

    Mormons believe the baptism ritual allows deceased people a way to the afterlife — if they choose to accept it.

    But the practice offends members of many other religions, especially Jews, who have expressed outrage at attempts to alter the religion of Holocaust victims.

    Vote (on Facebook): Does this practice offend you?

    Nobel-laureate Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel called on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney last month to use his affiliation with the church to block Mormon members from the posthumous practice, The Washington Post reported. A spokeswoman for Romney said his campaign would not comment on the matter, directing all comments to the church.

    In the 1990s, after negotiations with Jewish leaders, the church agreed to end to the practice, but revelations by an ex-Mormon researcher have shown it continues.

    In recent weeks, researcher Helen Radkey, using confidential Mormon sources who had access to the LDS database, revealed that Mormon temples had posthumously baptized the family of Holocaust survivor and Jewish rights advocate Simon Wiesenthal, Anne Frank, a Jewish teenager forced into hiding in Amsterdam during the Holocaust and killed in a concentration camp, and Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, a Jewish writer who was murdered while on assignment in Pakistan.

    Mormon church leaders, in a letter to temples worldwide, asked that members be reminded of the policy during Sunday services this past weekend.

    "The church is committed to preventing the misguided practice of submitting the names of Holocaust victims and prominent individuals for proxy baptism," LDS spokesman Michael Purdy said this week. "In addition to reiterating its policy to members, the church has implemented a new technological barrier to prevent abuse."


    Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, said in a statement he appreciated steps taken by church leaders to warn its members to stop the practice.

    "We can only hope and pray that those who have persisted in this practice will heed the pain it caused to the families of those who lived and died as Jews and adhere to the LDS Church's policy," Cooper said in a statement last week.

    ‘System set up to block’
    Radkey said Thursday she had already been blocked from the database under the new system, and was considering how she might continue her efforts toward revealing the ongoing practice.

    "I don't believe for five minutes that they're going to stop baptizing Jewish Holocaust victims," Radkey said.

    Purdy dismissed claims that the church was merely seeking to block Radkey's access, and said this week's move was just another step in the church's effort to stop the practice worldwide. He said that while nothing is foolproof, the church remained committed to keeping its word.

    "We are doing exactly what we have been asked to do and what we said we would do — denying access to names that should not be submitted because they are against our policy," Purdy said. "There is no account for a Helen Radkey. If she, or anyone else, is misusing a Church member's identity to search for Holocaust names, then the system is set up to block those kinds of activities."

    The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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