Racist homophobes, with latent polygamous tendencies, who have a thing for dead Jews.
That about cover it?
The public relations nightmare continues for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, with the latest brouhaha over the LDS practice of baptism for the dead.
It all started a couple of weeks ago, after it was revealed that Mormon proxy baptisms had been performed for the parents of famed Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal. Jews were not amused.
Then, more Jewish anger after Anne Frank turned up baptized yet again.
Next, the Hindus got into the act when rumors began circulating about Gandhi's possible reincarnation as a Mormon. And finally, back to the Jews again this past week after Daniel Pearl, the Jewish reporter who was kidnapped and murdered 10 years ago, was baptized by proxy. (Don't even wanna think about how Muslims would react if it turns out some well-meaning genealogy nut Mormonized the prophet Muhammad.)
All of these ordinances were reported by Helen Radkey, an excommunicated Mormon whose sole mission seems to be combing through the church's genealogical library, looking for anything and everything that might embarrass her former religion. (Hey, don't knock it; we all need a purpose in life.)
Blowback from these proxy baptisms has been both swift and sustained. For the public affairs department of the church, these last few weeks must have seemed like one of those recurring nightmares from high school. You know the one, where you go to class and you're completely naked, and everybody's pointing and laughing at you, and then suddenly the assistant principal is on the intercom informing everyone you've been sneaking around baptizing dead alumni from a rival school.
My Mormon friend Don totally saw this one coming. He said nothing good could ever come from the heightened visibility of a Latter-day Saint running for president.
"Aw, what could possibly go wrong?" I asked naively. "Surely the world will embrace us for our strong work ethic, clean living and family values."
Silly me.
Instead, Mormons are rapidly fulfilling that "peculiar people" prophecy. Actually, we passed "peculiar" several news cycles ago and are now well on our way to "flat-out whackjob weird."
But the best part is that some clever homosexuals -- apparently still miffed over that whole Prop 8 thing -- have started a new website, www.alldeadmormonsarenowgay.com. The site is exactly what its URL implies: an online proxy tool for converting deceased Latter-day Saints to homosexuality.
You enter the name of a dead Mormon -- or, if you don't happen to know any, use the "Choose-a-Mormon" function and the program picks one for you -- then click on the red "Convert!" button. It takes a few seconds to check the "Genealogical Index" and complete the vaguely mystical process, but then the button changes to a green "Converted!" notification.
It's that simple. And fun. I spent WAY too much time the other night converting all manner of deceased persons to homosexuality. Brigham Young. Bruce R. McConkie. J. Golden Kimball. John Wayne. Osama bin Laden. Batman. Mother Teresa. Elvis Presley. Tinker Bell.
Why, I even converted myself.
Yeah, OK. So technically, I'm not dead yet. And while I don't feel any different, I know I'm now a homosexual because after I typed my full name into the gay-converter and clicked on "Convert!" it eventually gave me the green "Converted!" confirmation screen.
Now, some of you Mormons out there are undoubtedly becoming offended at this point in the column. To which I say: "What took you so long?"
But I also say: "Don't you people get it? The gays are playing right into our hands."
Think about it. If the technology exists to convert dead Mormons to homosexuality, then it only stands to reason that the process can be reversed -- and applied to the living. So I have taken the liberty of contacting scientists at Brigham Young University, who are, as we speak, attempting to reverse-engineer whatever magical process is used by alldeadmormonsarenowgay.com. Once that process is replicated, we'll just switch the polarity so instead it converts folks to straightness, turn it loose on all living gays and -- checkmate! -- next stop, Hetero City.
Of course, I don't have the heart to tell my gay friends there's a doo-doo storm awaiting once word of their website gets out. Because even though it clearly states on the gay-making app that "Holocaust victims are not eligible for conversion," turns out they're no better at policing these sorts of activities than the LDS Church. In the space of just a few seconds, I easily converted to homosexuality all of the very same names for whom the LDS Church has taken it on the chin recently.
Just wait'll Helen Radkey gets wind of that. Widespread public outrage in three, two, one ...
Contact Mark Saal, who for some strange reason feels absolutely FABULOUS today, at 801-625-4272 or msaal@standard.net.
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