Jewish group wants halt to proxy baptismal rites

A Jewish organization today said it is cutting off talks with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the LDS Church's practice of baptizing for the dead.

Ernest Michel, of the American Gathering of Holocaust Survivors issued a statement today, which reads in part: "We ask you to respect us and our Judaism just as we respect your religion. We ask you to leave our 6 million Jews, all victims of the Holocaust, alone. They suffered enough."

Today's statement goes back to an agreement reached in 1995, when the LDS Church pledged to remove names of holocaust survivors the Church had performed posthumous baptisms for in its temples. Jewish leaders had objected to the practice, calling it offensive.

In recent years, Jewish leaders had expressed concern to the LDS church that the agreement was being violated.

LDS Church leaders dispute the accusations, calling Michel's statements today disappointing.

"The Church has been true to its word. It's done what we've said we would, going back to 1995. Or doctrine for work for the dead is very sacred to us, and it's one of the core doctrines of our church; and if properly understood, it shouldn't be a basis for offense to anyone," said Elder Lance B. Wickman, of the Church's Quorum of the Seventy.

The Church also released a statement today in response to Michel's accusations. It reads, in part: "Church leaders and members empathize with the depth of feeling of all Jews regarding the Holocaust. Such regard and empathy have motivated the Church to remain in talks about this subject for so many years. However, with his press conference, Mr. Michel seems to have unilaterally terminated those discussions and has presumably rejected the proposals set forth in the Church's 6 November 2008 letter. Those steps by Mr. Michel on behalf of the American Gathering were both unnecessary and unfortunate, and belie the long and valued mutual regard that has existed in the past years."

Several Church leaders met last Monday in New York with the Jewish organization and sent a follow up letter outlining the Church's positions.

LDS and Jewish leaders have debated the issue since 1994 and signed an agreement in 1995 to limit the circumstances in which Holocaust victims could be baptized. Under the agreement, LDS Church members could only enter the names of Holocaust victims to whom they were directly related.

The Church also agreed to remove the names of Holocaust victims already entered into its massive genealogical database.

Church spokesman Mike Otterson said the Church has kept its part of the agreement by removing more than 200,000 names from the genealogical index.

But since 2005, ongoing monitoring of the database by a Salt Lake City-based researcher shows both resubmissions and new entries of names of Dutch, Greek, Polish and Italian Jews.

Researcher Helen Radkey said her research suggests that lists of Holocaust victims obtained from camp and government records are being dumped into the database. She said she has seen and recorded a sampling of several thousand entries that indicate Latter-day saint religious rites, including baptisms, had been conducted for these Holocaust victims, some as recently as July 2008.

"I've seen a steady procession of Jewish Holocaust names, especially names with camps linked to them, going to the International Genealogical Index," said Radkey, who acknowledges that she has limited access to the records. "There's no possible way of knowing exactly how many names, but it's substantial."

Church leaders say they will talk about the situation, now that the discussions appears to be over, to decide what will happen next.

E-mail: spenrod@ksl.com

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