Do primary leaders still encourage putting 2 fingers behind your head to resemble feathers when singing the phrase “are about the Lamanites in ancient history” in the song “Book of Mormon Stories?” It’s been many years since I was in a sharing time setting but I remember performing this song this way when I taught primary many years ago. I grew up doing it and it seemed like everyone else did too. Did we ever collectively stop?
I’ve spent many years grappling with thoughts about the church’s impact on indigenous people. My Mormon heritage taught me to feel that I had some sort of claim to Native American experiences which were not mine to claim. Even as I write this I grapple with how to convey my thoughts. The best way I can sum up this “claim” would be, because I felt I “knew” the “true” identity of the indigenous people of the Americas, I failed to understand I was participating in racism. Why did I feel like I knew their true identity? Because my scriptures told me so. Prior to a rewording in 2006, the Book of Mormon stated Lamanites were “the principle ancestors of the American Indians” and this message is still consistent in our online and print materials.
As someone who isn’t an academic scholar or Church historian, I can’t speak fluently about the colonialist and Manifest Destiny influence on church doctrine, policies, and practices so I want to share the following story. As a parent who was diligent about the goal of raising children in righteousness, my family read scripture stories every night before bed. We used the comic book style ones because of the young age of our children. One night we had the lesson about the “curse of darkness” upon the Lamanites. I didn’t like presenting a story about peoples’ skin color being turned darker due to iniquity. That being said, I chose to continue the lesson because I had been taught that regardless of the ick factor, this was Doctrine.
Living in a small town (Eagle Mountain Utah circa 2008) my children did not have the gift of being raised in a diverse community the way I had and it was something I felt they were missing out on. My regret about that fact grew to absolute concern when we were taking a road trip to see my parents in Southern California. As we traveled we made stops for food and gas and in one restaurant my then 6 year old asked my husband and me “Why are there so many Lamanites here?” We both looked at each other in horror. What the freaking heck had we been teaching our child? We instantly knew we had done/were doing something wrong. We realized we should have made an opportunity to discuss race as a family and because we hadn’t, my son’s entire knowledge of race was based on racist scripture.
I’d like to say that moment shook me completely off my foundation of deeply held beliefs but instead it was more like I had suddenly discovered a huge crack in the foundation and was standing there trying to figure out who to call and how it would get fixed? As I re-read that last sentence I realize how dependent I was on people more spiritual than I or more wise than I, to tell me what I was supposed to do. As if life was just a set of rules and instructions to follow.
The messages I heard about the Lamanites my entire life shaped my view of indigenous people in a way that objectified them like the action figures in the Book of Mormon playset my kids played with on Sundays. Ever since I was little I’d look at the vast landscape on the drive from Orange County to Salt Lake and daydream a view of Book of Mormon battles through the backseat window. At the in-laws family campout, they had it on good authority that right there in Fishlake National Forest was the actual Gadianton Robbers hideout.
As I’ve gotten older I’ve learned more church history and specifically its impact on Indigenous peoples of North America. I learned about The Lamanite Project which was a church effort that removed 50,000 indigenous children from their homes and placed them with LDS families. There’s a infamous quote from then Elder Spencer Kimball explaining that the children placed with Latter Day Saint families were getting whiter skin. I found out from family members that human remains and artifacts of Native Americans were on display at LDS visitor centers throughout the 60s and 70s. It’s like we’ve just taken whole cultures and erased them and put in our own created characters, you know? And when I think about that I picture empty cradleboards and kids in primary chairs holding 2 fingers up behind their heads. It makes me weep. I recognize my part and know I can’t fix what’s been done but with all the resources out there I can learn and become anti-racist in thought and action.
I want to acknowledge I write this from the ancestral land of the Cowlitz tribe.
5 Responses
I appreciate this post, Jen. Thirteen years ago, I moved to MI for my husband to do research with a native psychology scholar as a PhD student. Since then, he has been in involved with about indigenous communities in different places. Growing up, I was taught to frame native origins and identities as you describe in this post. I had to go through a process of gaining humility and learning to treat native peoples and cultures as autonomous equals whom I don’t get to define. I had to accept we don’t concretely know their connection with the Book of Mormon–that this is a mystery rather than something I can claim. I felt embarrassed I had been raised with beliefs that could show up as very ignorant, cocky and condescending in outsider contexts.
From its roots, our religion stemmed partly out of the question of who Native Americans are and what their place is in the Christian story. This has made relations with native people complicated from the beginning. These were “new world” perspectives that felt relevant in Joseph Smith’s time, which show up very differently today.
It horrifies me to think that the Church played a role in taking native children from their families. Thank goodness North American governments have come to accept what seems obvious– that the best place for native kids to grow up is in their own families and that we understand attachment and cultural genocide better now. This was cruel and did so much damage. I recently visited an exhibit about the native filmmaker Analis Obamsawin. One of her famous films, the 1986 Richard Cardinal: Cry from a Diary of a Métis Child told the real-life diary based story of a native teen who despaired and committed suicide after years in transient neglectful foster care. All he wanted was to go home. This film prompted major changes in Canadian policies. Today, if native children need to be put up for adoption, First Nations manage this themselves and keep the children in their home communities.
There are Native Mormons who have their own interesting intersectional identities and their own perspectives of The Book of Mormon, etc. An example of complex and fascinating Mormon identity. I remember hearing about a gathering where Native Christians, including Mormons, talked about the struggles to be understood and appreciated in their intersectionality, it’s somewhat understandable as a Mormon Feminist. Some people treat our identities as an Oxymoron or impossible.
Our youngest kid had her last Primary program this year and they sang Book of Mormon Stories. They did NOT do the old hand motions of Native American stereotypes. My husband and I even commented on it at the time – that it’s nice they stopped doing those. (Writing from Doeg land on the western bank of the Potomac in Virginia.)
I am a member of the Ojibway tribe, and my grandfather was born on a reservation in Minnesota. He ran away from boarding schools, but both of his parents were products of the federal government’s boarding school system. My grandfather attributed much of the dysfunction in his childhood to the fact that his parents had no family role models because they were raised in a boarding school where the primary goal was to kill their culture.
My grandfather was a tall handsome man, who had been a Native American dancer in vaudeville shows in Minneapolis in the 1920’s. He was a union organizer in the 1930’s. He would take us to powwows in the 1970’s where members of the American Indian Movement would participate in their colorful costumes. We all adored my grandfather and I am proud of my Native American heritage.
But I taught American Literature as a student teacher in Utah Valley, and after talking about my grandfather in class, one of my Native American students confided in me after class. He told me that almost every day, he would be the target of demeaning racial slurs—sometimes shouted from a passing car, but more often in the halls of the high school.
While researching for a paper on racist marriage laws, I discovered that Minnesota was one of the only states where it was legal in the 1930’s for my grandfather to marry my white Polish grandmother. Apparently, there were a lot of lonely European fur traders, so by the time Minnesota was up for statehood, almost everyone was part Native American. Racism continues to be part of the American story and the church was influenced by American culture. The various authors of the Book of Mormon were also products of their cultural influences. If it makes you feel better, I was a primary chorister a long time ago, and a directive came from SLC a long time ago that we were NOT allowed to do the two finger feather motion during that song.
I am a convert to the Church and I have Native and First Nation ancestry. It isn’t easy to be a person of color in any community. I have had many doors closed to me because I was thought of as different. However, for every bad experience I had among the Latter-day Saints, I have had just as many positive ones. I owe my education to the efforts of the Church. I was able to leave a negative situation and find safety in the home of an LDS family.. Are there problems? You bet. Should some things change? Oh, yes! Would I give up my membership over these things. No. Absolutely no.! Instead, I work every opportunity I can to increase compassion, improve understanding and increase sincere love towards my imperfect Brothers and Sisters among the Latter-day Saints. There is a large spectrum of experiences between all Indigenous members of the Church and we have to acknowledge the hurt and help bring sincere healing to broken hearts, but to only see the negative is also a mistake. I could never have become the person I am today without the help of so many imperfect members of the Church.. If you are interested in what faithful Indigenous members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints think about their faith journey within the church check out The Gathering of Tribes YouTube Channel and Tribe of Testimonies on any national podcast provider. It might surprise you what these people have to say.
This is what I need to read. Help me find resources where natives are speaking a out their experience and help me as a white woman to listen and be taught.