I'm really not heading there. Question came up, and a friend thought that was the policy. I myself had no idea what the answer was.

Any of you have the low down?

Probably. That way the Morg can claim "there are no Mormons in prison." Another way to claim "quality," just like giving every Mormon boy Eagle Scout, just for wearing the uniform for the minimum required time.

Not necessarily because that attracts attention. Also, there is no one able to attend a Court of Love.

They certainly aren't going to hold a C o'Love in prison, standing in line with the Young Women who are bringing plastic bags of chocolate chip cookies.


Kathleen Waters

Do they have LDS chaplains in prison???

My guess would be "yes"...especially in Utah, Idaho, and Arizona...but I have no real idea.

Does anyone know?

Has anyone here ever BEEN a prison chaplain?

I'm going on memory here, but a previous edition of the CHI said
that if any member is convicted of a felony involving moral
failings (what felony doesnt?) that is prima facie evidence for
excommunication. My guess is that it means at that point it's
the convicted person's obligation to convince them NOT to ex him
or her.

My former husband was sent to prison for sexually assaulting my daughter. He plead guilty and they had his recorded confession.

I asked the Bishop if he would be ex'ed and he told me that they would have to wait and see; interview him, hear what he had to say, blah, blah, blah.

I stopped listening after that. He was not excommunicated, nothing. He didn't return to church and they have never bothered to look for him.

You get excommunicated if:
-- You're a known member of the church
-- You get convicted of a crime in which the facts are not in dispute

If John Smith last attended church 20 years ago and commits a felony in an area where his LDS paperwork hasn't caught up to him, it's unlikely anyone will care. There is no system in place to name-check convictions against church records. The system is on a purely ad-hoc basis (hence the 'known member' of the church).

Misdemeanors and civil infractions generally won't get you ex'd, though I guess that could be case-by-case.

There are LDS chaplains and LDS outreach programs in the intermountain west. Most county jails or state prisons in areas with a sizable LDS population will have one or a few of the local bishops' numbers on file in case an LDS member turns up.

A former family friend molested his daughter, went to prison and was only disfellowshipped. So, a person won't necessarily be ex'd.

wTF?!?!?

Like all things Mormon it just depends on the Bishop. Regardless of what the policy is,many Bishops will believe whatever sob story the convicted tells them of being railroaded,framed or whatever. I worked for the Utah Department of Corrections for many years and saw first hand that many Mormons inmates had not been ex'd despite a felony conviction. Most sex offenders were at least disfellowshipped and many ex'd, but many white collar type criminals were not even disfellowshipped.

Like all things Mormon it just depends.....

For what it is worth,in Utah the church maintains a very large and organized network of volunteers and missionaries involved in the prison. Most jails and prisons in Utah have a branch supervised by local priesthood leadership.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/2014 12:48AM by whiskeytango.

They like the white collar criminals, two different bishops created near financial ruin for my parents. When my dad went to his SP about the bishop who owed him $20,000 he was told that it was a civic matter and not a church one. He never lost his position as a bishop or lost his recommend.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/2014 12:55AM by brandywine.

Thanks, for all of your posts. I had envisioned that, by way of the rules in the Church Handbook, inprisoned church members might be automatically ex'd. Interesting to understand more what actually occurs.

I know of a member from the morridor who was dis-fellow-shipped for a felony conviction but was granted a plea in abeyance. At the end of the set time frame the conviction becomes expunged. The date to expunge was still a few months off and the Stake President denied the TR for him to see his daughters wedding.The explanation was guidelines from the CHI would not allow for TR till the record of conviction was sealed.

I think this was his tipping point, hope he sets himself free.

I knew this guy and he spent more than two years in federal prison. During the trial he spent time with the bishop telling his side of the story claiming he was a scapegoat and didn't know anything about it. So even though he was found guilty and served prison time, he was seen in the eyes of the church as innocent. He also dated and taught lessons in the LDS singles group during the trial and no one even knew about any of this until he went to prison, and even then it was kept a secret from most. Even the girl he was dating fairly seriously didn't know until he was convicted and had to be incarcerated (you'd think the bishop would have at least required him to tell her what was going on since they were both active members in the area). It made me think of the spin Joseph Smith created around his illegal actions and the support he got from the members...and still gets. This guy is back home and in the LDS singles scene again. He had a large support system around him that believed in him. It is mind boggling and yet, people do have to get on with their lives. It does seem as though just the fact that you are sent to prison would warrant excommunication and baptism upon your return, after doing your 'time' to fulfill repentance. But then again...maybe he was a scapegoat.

http://www.heraldextra.com/business/local/orem-man-sentenced-to-months-prison-for-tax-evasion/article_fd191d2a-b61e-5231-959f-19614d9b1588.html

Conviction should not automatically mean excommunication because our justice system does convict innocent people.

Grant Palmer served as an LDS prison chaplain, iirc. Once he concluded LDS Inc was bogus, he thought it more honest and useful work, than spending his time trying to brainwash LDS teens.

I've been out of the loop for many years, but I thought the only crime that required excommunication was a murder conviction. There are a lot of LDS prisoners in Utah. Robert Kirby has joked a number of times that the most self-righteous letters of condemnation he receives come from inmates at the state prison in Bluffdale.

Joseph Smith wasn't.
Nor those leaders incarcerated in the later 1800's because they refused to stop plural marriages.

Posters have said they've visited prisoners to do home teaching.

I knew a man who'd been convicted of white-collar, federal-level crime and did time in prison. He received no church discipline whatever.

I've known of two members in our ward who were convicted of sex crimes, both will be in prison forever (yay!!!!) and both were excommunicated. Thank goodness for that. I guess it depends on the bishop though, but we had different bishops during both of these cases. I just always assumed a felony conviction automatically meant you'd get exed.

I don't think they want to lose that many members.

TSCC's Handbook 1 even has instructions on forming wards and branches for prisoners, so I'd say no, it's not an automatic excommunication.

There is so much "it depends" around excommunication that you really can do a lot and still retain your membership.

Two things that will almost guarantee your excommunication: embezzlement of church funds (but if it's not the church's money you can probably get a pass) and making the church look bad.

I have a friend with a son in prison in FL. To the best of my knowledge he has not been ex'd.

He does have a home teacher and people in the ward near the prision have opened their home to my friend and her family so they can visting him.

They view this as more proof of the wonder of their totally special church.

I know some one who was sent to Prison for selling drugs, and hes stilla member.
He became a "runner" in the community and sold drugs because he was out of work.
When drugs were found in his car he was arrested at his home, his wife attacked a policeman and was also arrested. She lost her job and has a GBH on her now, she was working in the office of a local school (Payson UT).
He however has reminded a member and is active in their local ward, he did his time and returned to the area. But has had a very hard time finding employment because of his record.

So the answer to your question, is no they don't always get excommunicated.

But would an incarcerated person be exed for homosexual activity?

Would it be an aggravating factor whether he was the perpetrator?

And should he find himself to be the unfortunate bitch in the shower, would he be counseled to read "The Miracle of Forgiveness"?!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/2014 12:04PM by deco.

My husband went to jail ( not prison) several, several years ago, and he was disfellowshipped but not exed. It just depends.

If you've already had your second anointing ceremony (also known as calling and election made sure), you can do anything other than commit a murder and then boast of it and publicly dare the Bishop and Stake President's council to excommunicate you and you still can't be excommunicated.

Under that circumstance, you could go to prison for being a serial rapist, commit violent and crippling assaults on the innocent, commit bank robbery, theft of church funds, or anything else except murder, and the church still couldn't excommunicate you. To do so would require that they admit to having made a mistake and they would face embarrassment. They'll never do either.

Lol! Name one specific case where this has happened. This little diatribe is as bad as those people who claim atheists are time bombs of rape murder and plunder because they don't believe in divine retribution.

The answer is no, they don't just get excommunicated. They probably do if it has been really public and has embarrassed the church. But some of you recall the case of L. Wynn Johnson, sentenced to federal prison after the Bonneville Pacific case. Due to a health problem, he was even allowed to attend the temple while technically still a federal prisoner and while wearing an ankle bracelet. After his prison term was up, he was installed back in stake leadership positions, and finally he and his wife were sent on a mission as a non-paid faculty members at BYU-H's school of business. Because we all know that business really is that important in Mormonism.