So Dear Helen:  

This is to you  ( and all of my friends can join in). I’ve tried to come to some level of understanding about who you are and what you are about.  I’ve read your website, bio, and listened to you on talk radio. I understand that you are an internationally known genealogist and respect that accomplishment.

I want to first share some sentiments you expressed on your site that we have in common.  We appreciate our ancestors and the joy in researching about them, learning who they are and their connection with our own identity.  In your own words on your site:

We get to learn who they were, where and how they lived. It is important to honor and respect them, no matter what skeletons we may find in the closet. We are new growth from an old tree. Our ancestors are all part of the river of bloodlines we are descended from. They represent our unbroken, ancestral heritage. Our ancestry is part of our divine inheritance, and should always be treated with acceptance on our part. Spirit can help us understand how our ancestry contributes to our personal characteristics. Understanding our ancestors can help us understand ourselves.

Mormons agree with this.  Our ancestors are part of our divine inheritance, contribute to who we are and we may at times feel their influence in our lives.

So can we not take this one step further?  We believe that our ancestors have the same right and claim to all the blessings the Savior has in store for them as we do. How perfect a plan would it be from a perfect God or Higher Being as you may know Him, to allow us on earth to follow His prescribed course–of baptism, confirmation, sealing of families–without allowing it for the hosts of individuals who never heard the truth or who died without the opportunity to learn its fullness?  God is perfect and merciful.  He has provided a way for those baptisms to take place.  Temples dot the Old Testament pages–commands to build them; statements regarding their holiness and beauty; prescriptions on how to build the ‘sea’ or baptismal font; descriptions of the font they used for baptisms for the dead (with oxen representing the tribes of Israel surrounding the basin); explanations about the need to restore the temple after its destruction; directions regarding the protection of the most sacred part–the Holy of Holies or ark; descriptions of temple ordinances such as the anointing of Aaron and his sons, baptisms, etc.  Anyone familiar with those scriptures cannot deny the existence and centrality of the temple anciently.  Our witness to the world is that they and their purposes have been restored to the earth, and the beautiful sanctifying service that occurred there anciently occurs there today. I am a witness to you of that truth.

Now this post is not about Obama or his ancestors, Helen, nor about who may have done their work. I don’t have any knowledge about any of those named records.  This is about the practice in general and our duty to seek after our kindred relatives in our own lines and to perform for them what they cannot do for themselves, as we offer those individuals on the other side of the veil (who have died before us) a labor and gift of love which they are free to accept or reject.  This is what it’s about.

I have to say that it is harrowing to hear and totally false to assert that our performance of baptism for the dead means that individuals come from lesser stock or lesser faith.  That is not our claim; that is your false rendering of our belief, and you ought to correct that publicly, if you have integrity to do so.  We respect all faiths and believe that all who live according to the light they have will ultimately receive the fullness of the gospel and all of the blessings of eternal life, if they continue on the path.

I’m intrigued that you talk about wanting to live on a higher spiritual “frequency,” listening to what the Spirit is calling you to do. May I challenge and invite you to visit the Old Testament prayerfully and search out the scriptures on temple service, and see what you discover.  The place where the spiritual power, the greatest spiritual frequency comes, is in and through the ordinances of sacred temples.

Our love and best wishes for you in your spiritual journey.

We invite your response.