Mormons Try to Blunt Ouster : Exit of American Indian Official Raises Questions

Leaders of the Mormon Church who excommunicated the only American Indian ever appointed to the church hierarchy are busy trying to blunt the impact of his stormy exit and the questions he raised.

George P. Lee, the first Mormon high official in 46 years to be erased from membership rolls, is heading to the mountains alone for a month or more of fasting and meditation about his future outside the church, which he claims is polluted from the top by pride and racial prejudice.

“It’s the way of my people,” Lee, a Navajo and son of a medicine man and a role model for more than 40,000 Navajo Mormons. He lost his official standing in the church Sept. 1.

Hastily Scheduled Meeting

Two Mormon officials convened a hastily scheduled meeting last weekend with local church leaders at the Window Rock, Ariz., headquarters of the Navajo reservation. A similar session was arranged in Shiprock, N.M.

Navajo sources who attended the meeting in Window Rock characterized the session as an effort by the church to isolate Lee and his beliefs from his people.

“Generally they said it was not the church’s fault and that it was due to George,” said one Navajo, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “They are trying to nip it in the bud, but at the end we were all somewhat confused.”

Lee said in an interview he had no intention of recruiting his own following and discouraged disillusioned church members from leaving the faith.

Vain Men

But he did not retreat from his characterization of Mormon leaders as vain men bent on dislodging Indians from what Lee sees as their rightful place in Mormon theology.

Lee’s abrupt departure is seen by many Navajo Mormons as a validation of his claim that the church leadership under President Ezra Taft Benson is quietly moving to dislodge Indian members from their heritage.

Mormons believe that Indians are descendants of ancient peoples who sailed to the Americas and whose history is detailed in the Book of Mormon. The volume’s title page says it is written to the Lamanites, or Indians, “who are a remnant of the house of Israel; and also to Jew and Gentile.”

Lee says Benson’s predecessor, Spencer W. Kimball, taught that Indians are literal descendants of Israel, while non-Indian Mormons are Gentiles “adopted” into the House of Israel when they embrace the faith.

Descendants of Israel

Church spokesman Bruce Olsen said it was not his place to define current Mormon doctrine, but sources at the Window Rock meeting said Elder H. Burke Peterson attempted to do so by arguing that the blood of non-Indian Mormons is transformed, making them literal descendants of Israel.

“(Peterson) said that those who are being baptized into the church, their blood physically changes to that of the House of Israel,” said one source who demanded anonymity. “This kind of confirms what Elder Lee was saying.”

Lee contends that the belief that all Mormons are literal descendants of Israel reflects an attitude of white supremacy among Mormon leaders, who have systematically cut Indian programs at church-owned Brigham Young University and elsewhere.

Excommunicated for ‘Apostasy’

Lee, a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy since 1975, was excommunicated for “apostasy and other conduct unbecoming a member of the church” after an hourlong meeting with Benson, his counselors in the governing First Presidency, and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, an advisory body that supervises the Seventy.

Members of the three panels are known as general authorities in the 6.7-million-member Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

At the meeting, Lee read a 23-page letter detailing his concerns. Then, within minutes, two officials told him to turn over all church property, including a credit card and a signed pass with which faithful Mormons gain entry to their temples.

“It was just absolutely cold,” said Lee, 46, a father of seven who is without a pension or immediate job prospects.

A request to interview a member of the Twelve was declined. As a matter of policy, church officials do not divulge details of disciplinary actions.