HEART BEAT: Sins of fathers

By Felicia Mitchell

According to the Catholic Church, my father had something in common with polygamists.  Since the sacrament of marriage is insoluble, a person who receives a civil divorce is still married in the eyes of this church.  If he weds another woman, as my father did, outside the bonds of Holy Matrimony, he may well end up on his deathbed, as my father did, assured by visitors that he does not deserve forgiveness for his sins because he thought he could marry two different women.

Because our country believes in separation of church and state, no officials showed up decades earlier at our house and ferreted me away along with my brothers because I was living with a family that consisted of two adults living in sin with potentially illegitimate offspring. Furthermore, the Catholic Church invited my brothers and me through its doors with open arms.

The church I grew up with did not hold the sins of the fathers against their children.  That’s why I breathed a sigh of relief when a Texas appeals court ruled that the seizure of hundreds of children at the Yearning for Zion Ranch in Eldorado was unfounded and the children could go home to their mothers.

Men who rape or abuse women or girls should be punished, which is what is happening now with Warren Jeffs, former leader of that sect.  When children were removed from the compound and their mothers, though, I wondered why the authorities didn’t just arrest all the men on suspicion of abuse and leave the children in a familiar environment.

The call that initiated the legal battles in Texas was, moreover, a hoax.  All it took was for somebody to make a false claim, and the authorities were ready to pounce because of the sect’s religious differences.  Children are raised with values that may not necessarily be popular values, and women often marry young.  Not all marriages are forced marriages, however, just as not all marriages outside the FCLDS are, as they say, made in heaven. 

I wonder what would happen if a happily married polygamist family moved to Washington County, started farming, and decided to send its children to public schools.  Recognizing religious freedom as an important value, wouldn’t we be tolerant of this arrangement?

It’s hard to speculate.  Maybe families like that already live here, quietly, safely, apart from public scrutiny.  When I lived in Texas, I encountered a few polygamists.  No, they weren’t members of the FCLDS.  They were visitors to this country from other countries that sanction polygamy.

Because polygamy involving multiple wives tends to be found in highly patriarchal societies, it may become less of an institution over time, even for the FCLDS.  When I think of the recent events in Texas, I think of men reconsidering polygamy and related religious practices.

And I picture traditionally submissive women standing in front of cameras and judges to argue for their rights.  We may not agree with all their values, but we can recognize maternal love.