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Execution By Firing Squad Will Be First In 14 Years [Mormon - Open]
NPR ^ | June 17, 2010 | Jenny Brundin

Posted on 06/17/2010 6:28:06 PM PDT by Colofornian

Utah death-row inmate Ronnie Lee Gardner is set to be executed by a firing squad on Friday. Thirty-five states allow the death penalty, but death by firing squad remains an option only in Utah.

SNIP

Every detail of April 2, 1985, is burned into her memory. Gardner was in court on a murder charge when he tried to escape. An accomplice slipped him a gun, and he shot and killed an attorney and also severely wounded George "Nick" Kirk, who was a bailiff. Kirk didn't die, but VelDean Kirk says he wasn't the same active, cheerful man anymore. She says his final years were marked by excruciating pain and depression from a sedentary life.

His daughter, Tami Stewart, feels sorry for Gardner, but she can't forgive him. She imagines him in the death chamber. "He's going to feel that fear that he put into every one of those men. He's done. We've given him more than enough," Stewart says.

Gardner did get one choice: how he would die. In court, after being told he'd exhausted his appeals, the 49-year-old made his preference known.

"I would like the firing squad, please," he told the court...

...Utah's last firing-squad execution 14 years ago attracted more than 150 news crews from across the globe. They were interested in one thing: the method of execution.

SNIP

Utah historian Will Bagley says the reason this method of execution exists is rooted in Utah's history as a Mormon sanctuary. "I think we need to be honest about it. We have the last firing squads in the country as a legacy of Mormon theology," Bagley says.

Some early Mormon leaders believed in blood atonement for the most egregious sins. "To atone for those, Jesus' blood didn't count. You had to shed your own blood," Bagley says.

(Excerpt) Read more at npr.org ...


TOPICS: Current Events; History; Other Christian; Theology
KEYWORDS: beck; bloodatonement; brokenrecord; gardner; glennbeck; hischoice; lds; mormon
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To: BlueMoose

http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/mountainmeadows/atonement.html

http://mrm.org/blood-atonement

http://www.exmormon.org/bloodatn.htm


61 posted on 06/17/2010 7:22:55 PM PDT by reaganaut (The LDS church doesn't PRAY FOR the weak, they PREY ON them.)
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To: BlueMoose
one will have blanks to keep anonymous the shooter..

Pardon my ignorance but wouldn't the shooter with blanks know that by lack of recoil. I once was a CW re-enactor and of course, we fired our rifles with no bullets. There also was no recoil, as a consequence.

Please inform me on this. Thanks.

62 posted on 06/17/2010 7:24:14 PM PDT by OldPossum
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To: BlueMoose; All

Hogwash. See post 61 and books by Bagley for a start.

BA is well documented

“I [am] opposed to hanging, even if a man kill another, I will shoot him, or cut off his head, spill his blood on the ground, and let the smoke thereof ascend up to God; and if ever I have the privilege of making a law on that subject, I will have it so.”

- Prophet Joseph Smith, Jr., History of the Church, v. 5, p. 296, 1949

“[My life was in danger] if I remained there, because of my protest against the doctrine of Blood Atonement and other new doctrines that were brought into the Church.”

- Apostle William Smith, brother of Joseph Smith, Jr., Temple Lot Case, p. 98

“I will tell you how much I love those characters. If they had any respect to their own welfare, they would come forth and say, whether Joseph Smith was a Prophet or not, ‘We shed his blood, and now let us atone for it;’ and they would be willing to have their heads chopped off, that their blood might run upon the ground, and the smoke of it rise before the Lord as an incense for their sins.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 2, p. 179, February 18, 1855

“The time has been in Israel under the law of God, the celestial law, or that which pertains to the celestial law, for it is one of the laws of that kingdom where our Father dwells, that if a man was found guilty of adultery, he must have his blood shed, and that is near at hand.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 4, p. 219

“Will you love your brothers and sisters likewise, when they have committed a sin that cannot be atoned for without the shedding of their blood? Will you love that man or woman well enough to shed their blood? That is what Jesus Christ meant.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Deseret News, April 16, 1856

“Any of you who understand the principles of eternity – if you have sinned a sin requiring the shedding of blood, except the sin unto death – would not be satisfied or rest until your blood should be spilled, that you might gain the salvation you desire. This is the way to love mankind.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Deseret News, April 16, 1856

“I say, rather than that apostates should flourish here, I will unsheath [sic] my bowie knife, and conquer or die [Great commotion in the congregation, and a simultaneous burst of feeling, assenting to the declaration.]. Now, you nasty apostates, clear out, or judgment will be put to the line, and righteousness to the plummet [Voices, generally, ‘go it, go it.’]. If you say it is right, raise your hands [All hands up.]. Let us call upon the Lord to assist us in this, and every good work.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 1, p. 83; online at http://journals.mormonfundamentalism.org/Vol_01/refJDvol1-16.html

“Suppose you found your brother in bed with your wife, and put a javelin through both of them. You would be justified, and they would atone for their sins, and be received into the Kingdom of God. I would at once do so, in such a case; and under the circumstances, I have no wife whom I love so well that I would not put a javelin through her heart, and I would do it with clean hands.... There is not a man or woman, who violates the covenants made with their God, that will not be required to pay the debt. The blood of Christ will never wipe that out, your own blood must atone for it.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 1, pp. 108-109

“If you want to know what to do with a thief that you may find stealing, I say kill him on the spot, and never suffer him to commit another iniquity. I will prove by my works whether I can mete out justice to such persons, or not. I would consider it just as much my duty to do that, as to baptize a man for the remission of his sins.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 1, pp. 108-109

I know that there are transgressors, who, if they knew themselves and the only condition upon which they can obtain forgiveness, would beg of their brethren to shed their blood, that the smoke might ascend to God as an offering to appease the wrath that is kindled against them, and that the law might have its course.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 4, p. 43

“Now take a person in this congregation who has knowledge with regard to being saved... and suppose that he has committed a sin that he knows will deprive him of that exaltation which he desires, and that he cannot attain to it without the shedding of blood, and also knows that by having his blood shed he will atone for that sin and may be saved and exalted with the God, is there a man or woman in this house but what would say, ‘shed my blood that I may be saved and exalted with the Gods?’”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 4, pp. 219-220

“It is true that the blood of the Son of God was shed for sins through the fall and those committed by men, yet men can commit sins which it [the blood of Christ] can never remit.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 4, p. 54

“This is loving your neighbour as ourselves; if he needs help, help him; and if he wants salvation and it is necessary to spill his blood on the earth in order that he may be saved, spill it.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 4, p. 220

“If men turn traitors to God and His servants, their blood will surely be shed, or else they will be damned, and that too according to their covenants.”

- Apostle Heber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses, v. 4, p. 375

“It is not fully comprehended why it was necessary that Jesus Christ should leave the heavens, ... and come upon the earth to offer himself up a sacrifice; ... why this should be, why it was necessary that his blood should be shed is an apparent mystery.... What sins of the world did he take away? We are told that it is the sin which Adam committed.”

- Prophet John Taylor, Journal of Discourses, v. 10, pp. 114-115

“The people of Utah are the only ones in this nation who have taken effectual measures... to prevent adulteries and criminal connections between the sexes. The punishment, for these crimes is death to both male and female. And this law is written on the hearths and printed in the thoughts of the whole people.”

- Apostle Orson Pratt, The Seer, p. 223

“I say, there are men and women that I would advise to go to the Presidency immediately, and ask him to appoint a committee to attend to their care; and then let a place be selected, and let that committee shed their blood. We have amongst us that are full of all manner of abominations, those who need to have their blood shed, for water will not do, their sins are too deep a dye... I believe that there are a great many; and if they are covenant breakers we need a place designated, where we can shed their blood... Brethren and sisters, we want you to repent and forsake your sins. And you who have committed sins that cannot be forgiven through baptism, let your blood be shed, and let the smoke ascend, that the incense thereof may come up before God as an atonement for your sins, and that the sinners in Zion may be afraid.”

- Apostle Jebediah M. Grant, 2nd counselor to Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 4, pp. 49-51

“We would not kill a man, of course, unless we killed him to save him...”

- Apostle Jebediah M. Grant, Deseret News, July 27, 1854

“I would have a tendency to place terror on those who leave these parts [Utah], that may prove their salvation when they see the heads of thieves taken off, or shot down before the public... I believe it would be pleasing in the sight of heaven to sanctify ourselves and put these things out of our midst.”

- Apostle Orson Hyde, Journal of Discourses, v. 1, p. 73

“... We may talk of men being redeemed by the efficacy of his [Christ’s] blood; but the truth is that that blood has no efficacy to wash away our sins. That must depend upon our own action.”

- Apostle Amasa M. Lyman, Apostle, Journal of Discourses, v. 7, p. 299, 1859

“Has Jesus done anything that will bring salvation to you and me? The chief of what he has done is that he has revealed the plan of the Gospel – the scheme of human redemption, and manifested himself among his brethren; and we may say he has done a great deal more, for he has shed his blood for it. So have others shed their blood. But whose blood has cleansed you and me? It is said that the blood of Jesus cleanses from all sins. Then why is it that we remain sinners? It is simply because the blood of Jesus has not cleansed us from sin – because it has not reached us.”

- Apostle Amasa M. Lyman, Apostle, Journal of Discourses, v. 7, p. 298

“... inasmuch as the blood of Christ was shed for original sin unconditionally, but for the remission of actual sin conditionally.”

- Apostle Charles W. Penrose, Journal of Discourses, v. 21, pp. 81-82

“The principle, the only one that beats and throbs through the heart of the entire inhabitants of this Territory, is simply this: The man who seduces his neighbors wife must die, and her nearest relative must kill him!”

- Apostle George A. Smith, Journal of Discourses, v. 1, p. 97

“Joseph Smith taught that there were certain sins so grievous that man may commit, that they will place the transgressors beyond the power of the atonement of Christ. If these offenses are committed, then the blood of Christ will not cleanse them from their sins even though they repent. Therefore their only hope is to have their blood shed to atone, as far as possible, in their behalf. This is scriptural doctrine, and is taught in all the standard works of the Church.”

- Prophet Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, v. 1, pp. 135-136, 1954

“The Mormons believe in blood atonement. It is taught by the leaders, and believed by the people, that the Priesthood are inspired and cannot give a wrong order. It is the belief of all that I ever heard talk of these things – and I have been with the Church since the dark days in Jackson County – that the authority that orders is the only responsible party and the Danite who does the killing only an instrument, and commits no wrong.... Punishment by death is the penalty for refusing to obey the orders of the Priesthood.
“I knew of many men being killed in Nauvoo by the Danites. It was then the rule that all the enemies of the Prophet Joseph should be killed, and I know of many a man who was quietly put out of the way by the orders of Joseph and his apostles while the Church was there. It has always been a well understood doctrine of the Church that it is right and praiseworthy to kill every person who speaks evil of the Prophet. This doctrine was strictly lived up to in Utah...”

- Elder John D. Lee, Brigham Young’s adopted son and member of the Danites, John D. Lee Diaries

Others:

“I married Jesse Hartly, knowing he was a ‘Gentile’ in fact, but he passed for a Mormon, but that made no difference with me, although I was a Mormon, because he was a noble man, and sought only the right. By being my husband, he was brought into closer contact with the members of the Church, and was thus soon enabled to learn many things about us, and about the Heads of the Church, that he did not approve, and of which I was ignorant, although I had been brought up among the Saints; and which, if known among the Gentiles, would have greatly damaged us. I do not understand all he discovered, or all he did; but they found he had written against the Church, and he was cut off, and the Prophet required as an atonement for his sins, that he should lay down his life. That he should be sacrificed in the endowment rooms; where human sacrifices are sometimes made in this way. This I never knew until my husband told me, but it is true. They kill those there who have committed sins too great to be atoned for in any other way. The Prophet says, if they submit to this he can save them; otherwise they are lost. Oh! that is horrible. But my husband refused to be sacrificed, and so set out alone for the United States: thinking there might be at least a hope of success. I told him when he left me, and left his child, that he would be killed, and so he was. William Hickman and another Danite, shot him in the canyons; and I have often since been obliged to cook for this man, when he passed this way, knowing all the while, he had killed my husband. My child soon followed after its father, and I hope to die also; for why should I live? They have brought me here, where I wish to remain, rather than to return to Salt Lake where the murderers of my husband curse the earth, and roll in affluence unpunished.”

- Miss Bullock of Provo, Utah, quoted by Mary Ettie V. Smith, in Nelson Winch Green, Mormonism: its rise, progress, and present condition…, 1858, 1870 ed., p. 273

“In the excavations made within the limits of Salt Lake City during the time I have resided there, many human skeletons have been exhumed in various parts of the city…. I have never heard that it was ever the custom to bury the dead promiscuously throughout the city; and as no coffins were ever found in connection with any of these skeletons, it is evident that the death of the persons to whom they once belonged did not result from natural causes, but from the use of criminal means.”

- R.N. Baskin, Reminiscences of Early Utah, 1914, pp. 154-155

“It was one of the hot-beds of fanaticism, and I expect that more men were killed there, in proportion to population, than in any other part of Utah. In that settlement it was certain death to say a word against the authorities, high or low.”

- DaniteWilliam Hickman, Brigham Young’s Destroying Angel, 1964, p. 284

Concerning two captured Confederate commissioners in Utah, Brigham Young said he: “would put them where they would never peep. He [Brigham Young] uttered this sentiment with such a wicked wording of the lower jaw and lip, and such an almost demon spirit in his whole face, that quite disposed to be incredulous on those matters...”

- New York Tribune, July 15, 1865

“In the past decade, potential jurors in every Utah capital homicide were asked whether they believed in the Mormon concept of ‘blood atonement.’”

- Salt Lake Tribune, Nov. 5, 1994, p. D1

“Just last month, attorneys for condemned child-killer James Edward Wood in Pocatello, Idaho, argued that his defense was undermined by a visit from local [Mormon] church leaders who talked to him about shedding his own blood....
“His [Wood’s] attorneys contend Wood is a victim of a Mormon belief in ‘blood atonement.’ ... Judge Lynn Winmill... heard hours of testimony during the past week about Mormon doctrine on apostasy and forgiveness of sin. Wood’s lawyers even asked the bishop who presided over the church court that excommunicated Wood about secret temple rituals involving symbolic throat and slashing or disembowelment, but Winmill did not require him to respond.”

- Salt Lake Tribune, Nov. 5, 1994, p. D1, D5

“Accordingly, the doctrine asserts that those who commit certain grievous sins such as murder and covenant-breaking place themselves beyond the atoning blood of Christ, and their only hope for salvation is to have their own blood shed as an atoning sacrifice. In his writings, Joseph Smith only hinted at the doctrine, Brigham Young successively denied and asserted it, Joseph F. Smith ardently defended it, and in more recent years, Hugh B. Brown repudiated it and Joseph Fielding Smith and Bruce R. McConkie both have vigorously defended it in principle while staunchly denying that the Church has ever put it into actual practice, whereas most other General Authorities have prudently preferred to remain silent on the subject. It should be noted that the whole notion of blood atonement is so obviously linked to the Mormon literal mind-set that it does not seem to admit of a mitigated, symbolic interpretation and is either accepted or rejected outright, depending on one’s level of literalistic belief.”

- Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, v. 15, no. 3, p. 93

“To whatever extent the preaching on blood atonement may have influenced action, it would have been in relation to Mormon disciplinary action among its own members. In point would be a verbally reported case of a Mr. Johnson in Cedar City who was found guilty of adultery with his step-daughter by a bishop’s court and sentenced to death for atonement of his sin. According to the report of reputable eyewitnesses, judgment was executed with consent of the offender who went to his unconsecrated grave in full confidence of salvation through the shedding of his blood. Such a case, however primitive, is understandable within the means of this doctrine and the emotional extremes of the [Mormon] reformation.”

- Dr. Gustive O. Larson, BYU Professor, Utah Historical Quarterly, Jan. 1958, p. 62, note 39

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Blood Atonement and Apostle Bruce R. McConkie (1915 - 1985)

“From the days of Joseph Smith to the present, wicked and evilly-disposed persons have fabricated false and slanderous stories to the effect that the Church, in the early days of this dispensation, engaged in a practice of blood atonement whereunder the blood of apostates and others was shed by the Church as an atonement for their sins... there is not one historical instance of so-called blood atonement in this dispensation, nor has there been one event or occurrence whatever, of any nature, from which the slightest inference arises that any such practice either existed or was taught....
“But under certain circumstances there are some serious sins for which the cleansing of Christ does not operate, and the law of God is that men must then have their own blood shed to atone for their sins.”

- Apostle Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, p. 92

“Well, if I understand Elder McConkie [in the above quote], he was saying that, although earlier Church leader’s never believed, preached, or practiced blood atonement, we actually do believe in it and would practice it if we had the legal and political power to do so. (Even thought we didn’t when Brigham Young presided over the theocratic territory of Deseret.)”

- Keith Norman, Mormon scholar, Sunstone, Aug. 1990, p. 11


63 posted on 06/17/2010 7:24:57 PM PDT by reaganaut (The LDS church doesn't PRAY FOR the weak, they PREY ON them.)
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To: Colofornian
shoot ya bastards, don't make a mess of it...
64 posted on 06/17/2010 7:25:25 PM PDT by Chode (American Hedonist *DTOM* -ww- NO Pity for the LAZY)
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To: reaganaut

In answering some false and scurrilous charges published against the Latter-day Saints, the President of the Church, who then was Wilford Woodruff, on January 9, 1891, wrote to the


editor of the Illustrated American. President Woodruff referred to the doctrine herein being considered as “the blood atonement fiction,” and as “the false theory of blood atonement copied by the writer in the American from old newspaper fiction.”

Then he recites what the doctrine of the Church is when the term blood atonement is used simply as a synonym for capital punishment.


65 posted on 06/17/2010 7:25:37 PM PDT by BlueMoose
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To: 23 Everest

N00by Kid

I’m a Christian

and nobody here would suggest that I was anything but...

I believe that the Blood of Jesus has the power to save EVERYONE...

for EVERY sin...

Even you if you want to be saved...

meanwhile this guys own blood is not going to save him...


66 posted on 06/17/2010 7:26:01 PM PDT by Tennessee Nana
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To: BlueMoose

It is certainly not the current teaching of the Church and I have never in over 60 years of regular church attendance heard a single sermon on the subject or even a discussion in any church class.

- - - - -
YOU HAVE TO BE KIDDING. I HEARD IT TAUGHT AT BYU AND IN MY WARDS several times, weekly attender, and a member for less than that time.


67 posted on 06/17/2010 7:26:44 PM PDT by reaganaut (The LDS church doesn't PRAY FOR the weak, they PREY ON them.)
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To: 23 Everest

you too.


68 posted on 06/17/2010 7:27:05 PM PDT by reaganaut (The LDS church doesn't PRAY FOR the weak, they PREY ON them.)
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To: Colofornian
Did you read the article? Excerpt:

Thirty-five states allow the death penalty, but death by firing squad remains an option only in Utah...

Why should we care how the excrement gets flushed?

A bucket of champagne, a high-pressure fire-hose, a jar of dill pickle juice, or the usual ballcock and float tank should make no difference as long as it goes down.

Wouldn't it be effective if the firing squad used The Barrett M82A1 .50 Caliber sniper rifle? Talk about your crime deterrent!

69 posted on 06/17/2010 7:28:07 PM PDT by higgmeister ( In the Shadow of The Big Chicken!)
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To: BIGLOOK; mrreaganaut

Truthfully I can’t fathom that the act of execution is inhumane for someone who showed no humanity to his victims.

- - - -
That is my view. I don’t buy this cruel and unusual doctrine. I say they should be killed in the same manner as they killed.

If their victim was raped then skinned alive, they should be too.

Of course, I’m a medieval historian so I am more familiar with the more creative methods of torture.


70 posted on 06/17/2010 7:28:51 PM PDT by reaganaut (The LDS church doesn't PRAY FOR the weak, they PREY ON them.)
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To: OldPossum

There was a mention of that recoil thing on another thread..

that in reality the shooters would know

but they dont want the public to know that so they say its all secret...

or something like that...


71 posted on 06/17/2010 7:29:18 PM PDT by Tennessee Nana
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To: reaganaut

an eye for an eye was Biblical


72 posted on 06/17/2010 7:30:10 PM PDT by Tennessee Nana
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To: BlueMoose

explain the REST of the quotes then.

Why can’t the LDS just admit it was a doctrine taught and practiced in early Utah???!?!

Why all the lies and coverup?


73 posted on 06/17/2010 7:31:35 PM PDT by reaganaut (The LDS church doesn't PRAY FOR the weak, they PREY ON them.)
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Comment #74 Removed by Moderator

To: BlueMoose
Lawmakers, upset by the media circus

Why are they upset? The deterrent factor will only be increased.

75 posted on 06/17/2010 7:33:16 PM PDT by relictele (.)
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Comment #76 Removed by Moderator

Comment #77 Removed by Moderator

To: Grunthor
Yes but YOU are here, now and posted the article.

Yes, and you're living proof, having now made 2-3 posts in this thread with probably more to come, that guess what? Surprise! Surprise! You MUST be interested, too...or else you wouldn't be posting repeatedly on this thread.

(That's why I "love" so many inconsistent, hypocritical posters...'cause I don't say much of anything...sooner rather than later...they refute their own point or question!!!)

Thanks for bumpin' the thread.

78 posted on 06/17/2010 7:36:03 PM PDT by Colofornian (The Lds Lament: If only the 'Restoration' had occurred in a 'Once upon a time' era...)
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Comment #79 Removed by Moderator

Comment #80 Removed by Moderator


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