The 1978 Revelation onAnti-Blackness in Mormonism or ​Official Declaration 2

David O. McKay. Ninth President the Mormon Church. Served April 9, 1951 – January 18, 1970

Spencer W. Kimball. Twelfth President of the Mormon Church. Served December 30, 1973 – November 5, 1985

This post is less about the 1978 Revelation on Mormon anti-Blackness, or Official Declaration 2, as it is about why it happened at all. In that spirit, we're starting where we left off with the two official statements on on Mormonism and anti-Blackness. 

David O. Mckay signed both the 1949 and 1969 church statements on their anti-Black doctrine and practices. He became President two years after the first statement and died just after the release of the second one. During McKay's presidency (‘51-’70), which aligns almost directly with the Civil Rights Era, membership in this church tripled. So, one can assume that the amount of money this church was recieving in tithes also tripled. This assumption is backed up by the fact that, by the late ‘70s this church’s investment account, now known as Ensign Peak Advisors, was estimated to be worth over $1B. Today, its estimated worth is $100B.

Also by the 70's the church leadership realized that a major impediment to their membership growth, and thus economic growth, was their white supremacy. If you limit who can be a full member of your organization, you limit how many people will be a paying member of your organization. Thus, I believe the overt anti-Blackness of this church was ended not due to social pressure nor to God’s will, but because their white-supremacist practices were in the way of their money. 

This church’s population grew nearly 3x in the previous two decades. To continue to grow, especially in so-called Latin America, they had to expand who could join & pay tithes to their church.

Ongoing in the present, in 2018 President Nelson told members in Kenya that “Dowry is not the Lord’s way” and that instead they should be focused on tithing.

"We preach tithing to the poor people of the world because the poor people of the world have had cycles of poverty, generation after generation," Nelson said. "That same poverty continues from one generation to another, until people pay their tithing." (See also: prosperity doctrine).

Never mind that colonialism, imperialism, and capitalism has repeatedly stolen the wealth of these peoples, destabilized their governments, and destroyed their cultures and lands.

President Spencer W. Kimball searching, pondering, and praying

The 1978 Revelation on
Anti-Blackness in Mormonism
 or 
​Official Declaration 2

​Just as this church claims that the reason for their African Exaltation & Authority Ban is one of God’s many mysterious ways, the reason for 1978 rescinding of the ban also remains somewhat mysterious. Here’s a few of the things that led up to it:​

Black Colorado State University students holding up Black Power fists in protest against this church during the halftime of a BYU v. CSU basketball game on Feb 5, 1970

PROTEST:

The UT NAACP threatened to picket the Oct ‘63 gen con but dropped the plan when Pres. Brown promised to read a statement supporting full civil rights. In 1965, the same year as the Selma March, 300 protesters marched to the Church Office Building demanding that the Church endorse a civil rights bill then languishing in the Utah legislature. 

Later protests were concentrated against BYU athletics, as the school practiced Anti-Black segregation. From ‘68 & ‘70 at least 12 protests occurred during BYU’s sports games. Opposing teams would refuse to play or wore black armbands in protest. Many students petitioned their universities to refuse to play BYU. Stanford did stop playing BYU. But by the late 70’s, when the ban was lifted, protests were few and far between. ​

Selma March, 1965

2019 First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles at their new Rome, Italy temple. Of the 15 men, 14 are of European-descent even after 45 years of disavowing their white-supremacy.

BLOOD TROUBLE:

As this church further grew into an international imperialist institution they began to run into trouble determining if a person has “one-drop” of African blood. In the segregated US and South Africa this wasn’t an issue because the white population was deeply white-supremacists and legislated segregation. 

But in places like Brazil where race was determined by colorism rather than by genealogy and interracial marriage was common this church struggled to know who could and couldn’t hold priesthood. Additionally church members in Brazil, having not culturally internalized anti-Blackness in the ways we have in the US, found the church’s white-supremacist practices to be icky. ​

Jim Crow sign I altered for this post

In ‘75 Pres. Kimball announced the construction of a temple in Sao Paulo, Brazil. About 80% of Brazil’s population was estimated to be at least partly of African descent, though records are sparse. This lack of genealogical records and the difference in cultural understandings of race made church leaders realize that enforcing their temple ban would be very difficult. The Sao Paulo temple was completed the same year the Priesthood Revelation was released. ​

São Paulo, Brazil temple under construction

São Paulo, Brazil temple

BLOOD MONEY:

To raise funds for this temple, in the late 70’s some South American members donated the gold from their dental work to this church. In ‘97, Pres. Faust showed off some these gold teeth to encourage members to sacrifice for their church.

​That same year, Faust also helped found this church’s investment fund, Ensign Peak Advisors, which by the late 70’s was estimated to hold about $1B​

President James E. Faust at the São Paulo, Brazil temple in 1978 with a Black family.

REVEALED & RESCINDED:

Spencer W. Kimball got a special key for a special room and prayered there at night for many nights until he invited all the top 15 together for a prayer in which it was revealed that this church needn’t practice overt anti-Black segregation anymore. (Only heteropatriarchal segregation from this day forth)

President Dallin H. Oaks with a smug grin.

OPPORTUNITIES OF THE FUTURE:

In 2018, celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Revelation, Oaks spoke of those who wish to look back and understand why the ban was there at all. He advises: “most in the Church, including its senior leadership, have concentrated on the opportunities of the future rather than the disappointments of the past.” Which is advisable in a church that officially does not give apologies. ​​

Does neoliberal Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion actually fight white supremacist capitalism––or––does it just expand who gets to wield the white-supremacist capitalist power to oppress while bringing Black, Indigenous, Brown, and queer people, and women into environments designed to harm and exclude those persons?

Did the rescinding of the anti-African ban create less whites supremacist violence in this church?