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Transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection, The Louis Round Wilson Library
Citation of this interview should be as follows:
“Interview
R-0157, in the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern
Historical Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill”
Margaret Edwards was born into a large sharecropping family in Ayden, North Carolina, in 1950. Edwards begins the interview with some brief explanations of her family's tasks as sharecroppers and her experiences with segregation and racism in Ayden. Edwards explains that religion and church were central to both her family and the community. She grew up Baptist but converted to the Pentecostal Holiness Church after becoming an adult and marrying at the age of nineteen. By the 1990s, Edwards had become disillusioned with Pentecostalism, primarily because after seeking counsel from her pastor as a victim of domestic abuse, she was advised to stay with her husband because she had taken a vow to do so. In 1998, Edwards converted to Mormonism, and the majority of the interview is devoted to a discussion of her thoughts on the Mormon church and her role within it as an African American woman. Edwards explains that she found Mormonism appealing because the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints (the formal name of the Mormon church) was accepting of her, and she appreciated the centrality of family to their doctrines. Edwards speaks at some length about her desire to eventually re-marry (having since divorced her abusive husband). When asked if it was important for her to marry an African American man, Edwards explains that while she would find it most ideal to marry a man who was both African American and Mormon, her faith trumped her racial preference. She explains that the Mormon church shared her belief that interracial marriage between two Mormons was preferable to interdenominational marriage between people of the same race. Edwards addresses gender hierarchies within the Mormon church, arguing that although she had enjoyed a more active role she was able to play in the Pentecostal Holiness Church as an ordained minister, she did not begrudge the limited role of women in the Mormon church and did not view it as an encroachment on her independence. In addition to charting such intersections of race, gender, and religion in the Mormon church, Edwards discusses tensions she had experienced between the Mormons and other Judeo-Christian religions throughout the South. While her children did not share her Mormon faith, they were ultimately accepting of her choice. Others, however, were less tolerant, and she describes various ways in which other churches and faiths found themselves at odds with the rapidly growing Mormon presence in the South.
Margaret Edwards grew up in a large, African American sharecropping family in Ayden, North Carolina during the 1950s and 1960s. She eventually settled in the Raleigh area. Following her experiences with the Baptist and Pentecostal Holiness churches, she converted to Mormonism in 1998. In this interview, she discusses her role within the Mormon Church as an African American woman; the intersections between race, gender, and religion; and the attitude of other denominations toward Mormonism.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
We're having an interview. This is an interview of African Americans who have converted to Mormonism. My name is Barbara, Barbara Copeland, and I am the interviewer. The interviewee is Sister Margaret Edwards, and today is Sunday, January 20th in the year 2002. Today we will be talking about African Americans who have converted to Mormonism. Okay Sister Margaret, I just wanted to start out asking some real basic simple questions before we get far into the interview. Wanted to know where was your first homeplace and where had your parents come from?
My first homeplace was in Pitt County. As far as I know that's where my parents were from. Pitt County, North Carolina, Greenville.
So then when did you come here to Cary?
I came here in Raleigh in 1992, November 1992.
So you were, stayed in Pitt County for most of your life.
In between I lived in a small town called Franklinton, which is thirty miles north of here. I stayed there about fifteen years and then came.
Oh okay. How many people lived in your home when you were growing up?
Oh brother. I'm from a large family, fifteen kids. Fifteen kids. Ten girls, five boys.
Wow. Okay. Are you closer to the oldest—
Youngest, next to the youngest. So by the time me and my twin came a long some of the older had grown, so they would help my mother raise us.
So you said you have a twin?
I did. She's dead now.
Where did you attend school in Pitt County?
In Ayden, North Carolina. I small town called Ayden. It's like ten miles east of Greenville.
Did your family attend church?
Yes, they were Baptist. My parents, both parents were Southern Baptist.
So it was pretty strict that you all had to go to church?
Yes.
Okay, did you have any jobs or responsibilities as a child?
Well we had our regular chores. Yeah. Oh yeah. We had a farm. In fact we were sharecroppers, so we had a lot to do helping my parents raise tobacco, cotton. So we had lots of things to do.
So after school you had certain chores that had to be done.
Oh yeah.
Wow. So then when did you leave home?
I was nineteen. I got married when I was nineteen.
That's when you—
That's when I left home.
And went to Franklinton.
No, not right then. I stayed in, about almost ten years I stayed in there, in Pitt County.
After you got married.
Yeah.
What was your first job do you recall?
My first job working in a nursing home.
When you all were coming up, who made most of the decisions in the family? Was it your mom or your dad?
My mother. My mother was the strong one. She was the disciplinarian, and she was a strong disciplinarian. My father I mean he wouldn't do anything unless you really pushed him to discipline us. She was the one who did the discipline.
Did both of the parents work outside the home or did they just do like the sharecropping?
Sharecropping the whole family together.
What would you say was the most important to the people in your community when you were coming up?
I guess, I guess the church.
The church environment. Everyone in the area pretty much went to church?
Right.
Okay, did, how were the houses like the community. Was it everyone lived real close together or—
We were kind of spread out.
Or spread out. Was it the kind of closeness wherein you pretty much knew everyone that sort of thing?
Right. Even the white and black. We all knew each other in the neighborhood.
What year, what year were you born because I was trying to see or trying to get a good understanding about the era wherein we had the sit-ins? You remember when we had the sit-in in Greensboro?
Yeah. I barely remember. I was born in 1950. I remember some of it.
Because yeah, I was born in '60 so we're—
So you probably don't remember.
Well, I wasn't born here in North Carolina. It wasn't until I got up some age that I stsarted learning about it through school. But wanted to know when you were coming up as a child did you experience racism—
Yes.
In school?
I went to an all-black school all my twelve years to an all black school, but I remember, I do remember some of the racism like at the cafeteria in the town. We had to go through the back. Yeah.
See that's what I was trying to—
Then they had one counter in Ayden and places where I went to school at we had to stay outside, and they gave us our food through the window, and the white people were allowed to go inside and eat. We had to stay outside. I remember that.
And sit at the counter, they were able to sit at the counter.
Right. Right.
See and so that's what I was trying to figure out if maybe you
ever experienced any of that because I never experienced any of it. I
guess maybe because I was born up North. I was born in New York and
lived there up until I was twelve, and then that's when I
came to Durham in Durham, North
And fountains, yeah.
The two separate fountains. I never experienced any of that. All of the schools that I went to were mixed. We had all different races, and it was, I never got a sense that there was segregation of any sort nothing like that. I do remember, but of course this is way after I finished high school. Just here recently maybe I would say in the past ten years, maybe seven or ten years where they were, the school districts here in the Research Triangle area, Durham, Raleigh and Chapel Hill they wanted to do a redistricting of the subdivisions to make it so that it was an even distributions of blacks and whites in the county schools as well as in the city schools. Because I do remember when I was in high school in Durham that it was predominantly a predominantly black in the city schools and that there were more whites in the county. But it wasn't so cut and dried wherein you felt like this was a predominantly black school because we did have some whites, a good sizable population of whites who went to our schools. So I was just wondering if you experienced that and what those experiences were like for you.
I mean it made me angry, but it wasn't much being a child there wasn't much I could do about it. Just go with the flow. We just had to, to keep safe we just had to go along with it. We weren't allowed to fight back. Our parents didn't want us to fight.
Yeah. Was there any of the people or any one person in your family that's older than you that you were especially more especially close to?
Yeah, one of my older sisters Mae Ella.
Okay. Describe the different patterns of relationships between your parents and your siblings and yourself. What were the relationships like?
Well, mostly since my mother was so strong we were mostly scared of her. Yeah. We were scared of her. I was anyway. I'd try not to make her mad or anything. But me and my twin we were very close. Not as close to my younger sister. She had a twin too. The last four kids were twins, were two sets of twins.
That's interesting. Oh wow. So then there are a set of twins that are still living.
Yeah. Right.
What do you remember mostly about what your home looked like the decorations, the furnishings and just how things were arranged when you think about, when you think back to when you grew up in your home? What are some of the things that first come to mind about your house?
I remember the front porch like we used to sit out there in the summer time we'd sit on the front porch and drink lemonade or tea and stuff like that. I always wanted a house with a front porch, but I haven't been able to get one. I miss that.
Let's just say not yet.
Yeah not yet. I really miss that. I was a tomboy and I did mostly followed what my brother did, and what they did I did because I was a tomboy.
So you weren't like the type that would sit in the house and play with your babydolls and that—
Uh uh. I was a tomboy. My twin sister was just the opposite.
Oh okay. Yeah. Describe what the holidays were like, like Christmas, Thanksgiving, how were the holidays.
Oh the holidays were wonderful.
I bet it was with all those.
We had lots of food. We didn't have a lot of toys. There was some times when we didn't even get toys. But we had lots of food I can remember. I can still smell the cakes and turkey and stuff.
Just when you think about it. You can. Yeah.
Right.
Who would you say did most of the cooking, most of the arranging the holiday festive and that sort of thing?
My oldest sister because she's old enough to be my mother. She's got a daughter older than me and a son the same age as me. She did that. She did most of the—because she had to take, she had to take over raising us because my mother had gotten sick. She had cancer, breast cancer, and she had heart trouble too.
Is your dad, your mother and father still living?
Uh uh. They're both dead.
Okay. What would you say was the most important traditions at home when you were coming up? Like what were some of the things that you all did like all the time, like a ritual type thing besides like going to church every Sunday?
I can't think of anything now.
Did you ever experience furnerals when you were coming up, going to funerals?
Yeah.
I would imagine those were pretty sad events especially for children. I know that it was a pretty sad moment for me when funerals happened in my family when I was really young. It just it was just pretty sad. So when I think about funerals in my adulthood life I often not want to go and see the person because it just conjures up all of those sad memories from people that were in my family who passed away when I was little. So yeah. I can imagine. It could be a pretty sad state of affairs. Of course now a days they still pretty much have the same traditions. A lot of families they'll have like a wake in the house.
Oh yeah I remember the wake. I remember. Which I'm glad they cut out. Because I remember, when I was very small I remember them having wakes in the house. I remember being frightened. I was very, very scared.
I went to one family member's it wasn't my, the house that I grew up in when I was very little. We lived in New York, and some family on my mother's side had passed away, but they lived in like upper parts of New York, and it was like a cousin of my mothers. So we went and my mother, I remember her telling me and my three younger sisters because I'm the oldest of four. We're going to Aunt Sadie's because her brother passed away, and so we're going to the funeral. So I was just thinking that the funeral was going to be in a church, and it wouldn't have ever thought that it was going to be the body or the wake was going to be in the house. Sure enough it was. That was a very scary moment for me. Then a few years later after that event when for Easter my mom we're going to Aunt Sadie's, and we're going to visit. I remembered the dead relative being in the home, so I immediately did not want to go because I thought about that. That was my experience, one of my first experiences of funerals. So now a days they have, they still do have wakes at home in homes, but for the most part you go to a funeral parlor, and so I'm kind of glad about that because—
I am too.
It just separates it more and makes it a little bit better I think to deal with. How important was religion, religious training in the home. Tell me about how your mother and your father viewed religious training?
They were very important to them. They kept some like they don't, Sabbath Sunday. They were very, very strong about not doing any work and stuff on the Sabbath day. So religion was very important to them.
Now what kinds of work would you say your dad did? I know that you had mentioned about the sharecropping, but were there other kinds of work that he did as well?
Uh uh.
Okay. Who would you say in your family took responsibility for childcare? Was it just primarily your older sisters or did you have a—
My mother until she was not able. Then my father and then my oldest sister. She did.
What would you say is the major differences in your education and your parents' education?
Well, I mean I graduated from high school, and then I went to Wake Tech for a while.
In Raleigh.
Uh huh. My parents they had to stop at like fourth grade or something like that. My father couldn't read. My mother could read, but my father couldn't. So I think she stopped in something like the eighth grade or something like that. So they weren't that educated.
Okay. Well, yeah. Yeah sometimes that does happen wherein you can't continue schooling especially like with my parents, my mom comes from a large family as well. I think there were like twelve of them. My mom was one of the younger ones. I remember her telling me that she had to stop school at the eleventh grade because they had to help out on the farm.
That would hurt though.
Yeah, because she came so close. She only had one more year to go. But the family, my grandparents needed her, and so she had to do most of her work, just working on the farm and could not really finish out that last year. What would you say that you learned from your parents that has helped you live your own life? What were some of the things that you learned from how they raised you how to bring into your own life and guide you in your own life?
Faith. I learned faith, their faith. Strength I learned from my mother. Although I felt like her discipline was misplaced sometimes. I learned I could be strong like her. I think I'm more like her than any of them.
Than any of your brothers and sisters.
Um hmm.
Really. Were you ever married? You did mention. You said you got married.
I still am separated. Have been for awhile.
How long had you known your husband before you got married?
About a year.
A year before. Okay. You have children. I think you mentioned you have—
Um hmm.
You have—
Four.
Four.
Three girls and one boy.
Okay.
They're all grown.
I guess you probably said no I'm not going to have a large family like my mom had. You know now a days there are not, families are not as big as they were.
In the Mormon church they are.
Yeah. Yeah.
Because they believe in procreation.
Right.
They don't believe in that you should do anything to stop creation.
Exactly. Now that you've mentioned the Mormon church I guess this would be a good time where I could just ask you some questions about that. You were raised in the Southern Baptist tradition, and you continue going to the Baptist church.
Well, at one point after I got grown I converted over to the Holiness.
Oh okay. Okay the Pentecostal Holiness.
Right. Right.
At what point did you decide to convert to the Mormon church or how did you first become a Mormon?
Well, the missionaries came by my house. They asked me was I interested in hearing about the truth, the Gospel and I told them yeah. But I was busy then, and I asked if they could come back. So they were on it. They were back the next day. They went just like that.
The very next day. During that time were you still an active member in the Pentecostal?
No, I had left the Pentecostal church because I had gotten at the point where I was disillusioned by it by the things I saw in the Pentecostal church.
Oh really. What were some of those—
I was very, very disillusioned. Now I had bad experiences in the church because okay my husband was abusive, physically abusive to me. I would go to my pastor and his wife and tell them that because they were supposed to have been counseling me. They would tell me that I had to stay with my husband until death. You made that vow; you have to stay with him. They told me you married a devil, you're a devil until you die.
Oh really.
Right.
Oh my gosh. Well were, did they counsel him as well?
No.
They didn't feel like he needed counseling that it was you that needed the counseling.
Yeah, they felt like I needed it.
Oh okay. So with that you just felt disillusioned and—
With the whole thing the whole church at that time. I was disillusioned with the church period during that time. I was inactive in the church at all.
So when the missionaries came they came at the right time for you.
Right. Right.
So after they sat down and went over some of the lessons with you I imagine that's how you became involved is they went over the lessons. Then they invited you to the church.
Right. I went to the church. I think I went to the church a couple of times before I decided to be baptized.
Oh okay.
That was the next step.
Right. Now what would you say from those first couple of church meetings, what would you say that was the most striking to you or that was the most important to you that made you feel like you wanted to become a member?
Because they were accepting of me and it didn't matter to them what I looked like or how, it didn't matter to them about anything. It wasn't, they just accepted me because I was me. I didn't have to make a certain amount of money because you know how it is in so many churches.
Oh yes.
They've got looks. Some of the women have to be dressed from head to toe, everything matching. It didn't matter with them. It didn't matter that my skin was darker or lighter. It didn't matter. I the mission, when I went the missionary that came up to the house he sat beside of me in the church, and he walked me through the whole thing and stuff. He made me feel accepted.
Now was this, the church that you joined was that the one here in Cary?
Um hmm.
Okay.
I've been there four years now.
You've been a Mormon for four years.
Um hmm.
Okay. Okay. Well that's wonderful. Now tell me a little bit about the church callings.
Oh yeah. When everyone becomes a member, they get a calling. Everybody. Right now my calling is the Gospel in Action coordinator. The kids have some goals to meet. By the time they're eleven they have four goals to meet, and they have to meet. I have to make sure they meet those goals by the time they get to be eleven years old.
Oh okay. So those are like personal goals within their life or—
Well, one of them is. One is like doing something for their neighbor. Maybe working with food shuttle, doing something anything to help out people. That's one of them.
So that's like an outreach to the children to keep them actively involved in the church in doing things like community service type things.
Right.
That's wonderful. So they have like an agenda of four different things.
By the time they get eleven and they have to be
Oh that's wonderful. That's wonderful.
Callings are very important. When you become a member of the church, you have to have a calling.
Okay. Now I'm wondering is, how does that work? Does, is it the bishop approaches you and tells you?
And asks. He asks first.
Oh okay. He asks you if this is something that you would like to do or does he come to you and say this I had a vision or the Holy Spirit told me—
He is lead by the spirit.
Lead by the spirit that this is what you should do in the church?
Right.
Oh okay. Wanted to know also about I think it's called like family night on Mondays.
Yeah, family home evening.
Tell me a little bit about how that.
I'm by myself, but I still have it. It's important. The first presidency I mean he's adamant about us having family home evening. Most of what I do is I pray, sing a song and read scriptures and then pray in closing.
So you just do that for yourself on Monday nights even though—
Yeah. Sometimes people in houses sometimes they'll invite me over to their house on family home evening.
Oh okay.
I thought I was exempt because I was by myself. The bishop, no way.
Oh wow.
Everybody has to do it.
Right. Even if it means that you have to go and fellowship with someone
else just to get involved in it.
Because really because they I believe that's what God wants us to do. The Heavenly Father wants us because the family is very important to Heavenly Father.
Right.
That's the other reason why I love being a member of the church because of the family. They're very, very family oriented. I love that.
Right. Had you ever thought about wanting to remarry or seek another husband?
Yeah. I am one day. One day I am hopefully. Hopefully I do. I don't—
So what would some of your criteria be for an ideal mate for you?
Well, he has to go the same church I go to. I don't want to marry somebody that's in another church. Financially able to that we both can be able to prosper financially, and looks, I'm not into looks the physical as long as he's a good provider physically and spiritually.
Right. Right. Exactly. The reason why I asked that is because normally well there's two different—. Some people look at it and come at that question two different ways.
The physical.
No. Some African American women who are in the Mormon church
I'm a lot of times I'm wondering are they joining
the Mormon church in order to just find an African, an ideal African
American, marriageable African American mate. Some have said that well,
yes I've gotten tired of relying on African
Most Baptists do.
Yeah. So in talking with some they have said well I like the Mormon church, and I've joined the Mormon church hoping that I can find an eligible, marriageable African American man. Now the other flip side to that is that I've interviewed some African American women who are in the Mormon church. They feel discouraged that they're not going to meet another African American Mormon marriageable man to meet, to marry, so they have said that they would be willing to marry outside of their race as long—
I am.
Oh okay.
I'm willing to marry outside of my race too. As long as the person makes me happy.
Right. Right. Well for some women they said that race is very important to them. That they're willing, even though they're Mormons they're willing to marry outside of their faith to find an African American man and some have said to me that no, their faith is more important and they have to make sure that the person is Mormon like they are.
That's the way I would love to have it, but I couldn't if I had to marry outside my religion, I would. I would prefer—
You would prefer that they be Mormon.
Right.
Right.
Well, like I said they start early teaching their kids what right and what's wrong.
Because they do in the Baptist church too.
Most of them by the time they graduate and stuff they most of them have developed their talents. A lot of them, they start early teaching them like piano lessons. Most of them as soon as they learn to walk they're playing the piano, and by the time they graduate from high school they're very, I mean their talent is developed. That's what I miss from my childhood. I wish I could go back and my parents had taught me a talent.
Right. Did you have the opportunity, you didn't have the opportunity to raise any of children in the Mormon church?
No, they don't like it. My kids are totally against the Mormon church.
Okay, and have they ever expressed to you why it is that they don't like the church? What are some of the things that they find against it?
They think that well the first time when I joined the church, they said it was a cult. Yeah. But I think they pretty much adjusted to me being a member, but they don't, you can be a member mama we don't. Don't try to put it on me and my kids.
So for your four children what religious affiliation are they then? Are they Baptist?
Well, one of them is a non-denominational. The other one I guess she's, I guess two of them are non-denominational. The other two, they're not active in church anywhere.
Oh okay.
I have one granddaughter I used to take with me to church. She enjoyed going, but her mama, she was at the point to be baptized, but her mama didn't want for her to be baptized.
Oh right because once they get a certain age, I think it's age eight or nine.
Eight.
Eight then they're eligible to—
Be baptized.
Right. Did your granddaughter like the church?
She loved it. She used to go with me every Sunday. She still talking about being baptized. Her mama—
Doesn't want her to—I just think it's a wonderful opportunity for the children. It's a beautiful environment to raise the children.
Yeah. And they learn the Gospel well.
Right.
Not like the church that I was in before I became a Mormon. The kids weren't taught. They were not taught. They didn't have anyone there to teach them.
Right. Right. Yeah it's just very a huge difference between the church environment within the Mormon church and the Baptist church. It's just so family oriented, and you mentioned earlier about there are a lot of large families within the Mormon church. Tell me a little bit about that. You were telling me the reason why there are such a large families, many of them.
Because they don't think they should do anything to hinder procreation. They believe in the Heavenly Father wants them to procreate to have kids, and so women for women it's a joy. It's a blessing for them to have children. They're adamant about that. So that's why you see so many children. Now my bishop he has eight.
He has eight children.
Yeah. It's another lady in there has nine.
Nine children.
Yeah.
Now are they older couples or are they—
One of the ladies she's probably in early '60s. All her kids are grown now. She's got nine.
Wow. Tell me a little bit about like when the children, once they get a certain age there's something like a seminary school.
Yeah, they go to, I think it's fifteen.
Age fifteen is when they start.
Yeah. They have to go every morning. They have to get up at six. I think it's at six to seven every morning.
Wow for just that one hour. But they learn about the Bible and about the Mormon doctrine.
Right. Right.
So that this way once they become, once they are ready to leave high school then they're ready to go to missionary, go out on a mission—
Right.
And know the Gospel.
Right.
That is very interesting because I often wondered how once they finish high school how are they equipped to be able to go to different countries and become, be a missionary. When do they get the time to learn the Bible really well, and that's I guess maybe it's when they go to seminary school. Is that like Monday through Friday or just—
Um hmm. Monday through Friday.
What do you say that the kids' response just from being in the church and you having a calling dealing with the children. Do they like going to seminary? Are they happy about it or—
As far as I know they are. I guess they hate getting up so early, but they're excited. Their teachers always report that they're excited about because right now we're doing the Old Testament. They love that.
Oh okay. That's interesting. Wanted to know also about let's see I think I asked this question about the church, the temple, the new temple that they have in Apex.
Have you been there?
No. No I haven't been.
How long have you been a member?
Well, I'm not a member. I've just been visiting the church because I've taken up this class learning about Mormonism through college. So I'm learning about the religion, and I've been going and visiting, but I have not become a member. I've been raised in the Baptist tradition, and so that's pretty much still really within me, the Baptist tradition, and it's just been so deeply ingrained in me. I've been in church all my life, and so I since now—
It's hard to get away from those Baptist.
It well, yes it is. Since I am a religious studies major I've been visiting different denominations. I've even gone to non-denominational churches.
They mostly shout
Right. So just so that I could increase my awareness of the different traditions within the various denominations. So I really don't belong to any one particular denomination or one particular church because I've been spending a lot of time going and visiting different churches and learning about different religions. But I really like and see a lot of positive influences and positive teaching within the Mormon church. Yeah, but wanted to know if you've been to the temple.
Um hmm. Several times.
This one here in Apex.
Um hmm.
What is that experience like?
It's wonderful. Well, I can't talk, I mean certain things.
Right. Because some of it is sacred.
Right. We can't talk about. But I can talk, we do baptism for the dead. You ever heard of that?
Yeah.
Do that.
Okay. And that's basically—
By proxy.
Oh okay.
If some of your relatives had died and not knowing the Gospel, and everybody had to be baptized and before like the scripture said repent, be baptized in the name of Jesus, everybody had to be go through that.
And that's being submerged under water.
Yeah, so we do it by proxy for someone that's passed on.
And that gives them the opportunity.
Right.
To decide to become Mormon in the afterlife.
Right. Decide whether they take it or not. Accept what we did for them or not.
Okay. That's a very interesting. That is one of the things that I've learned.
You've been to the building.
No, I haven't.
It's so beautiful. It's marble.
Yeah. Yeah. I just well just seeing the various church structures in textbooks about the Mormon church they're so different in structure.
The one in Washington, D.C. I went to that one. That's the first one I went to after I—you had to be a member a year before you can go.
To the one in Washington.
For all of them.
Oh okay.
My year was up that's why I went to Washington. They hadn't built that one in Apex yet. The one in Washington, D.C., it is so beautiful.
I bet it is a wonderful experience to go into such a holy temple and to know that you're on holy grounds.
I was dressed in white from head to toe.
Wow. I bet that is a wonderful experience. If you were to get married again, would you want to have a temple wedding?
Yes. Yeah.
Tell me a little bit about some of the differences.
If I marry somebody outside of church, I can't have a temple marriage.
Right. I know so he would have to be Mormon.
Right.
Tell me some of the benefits of what you see of having a temple marriage would be?
I think for one I'm pleasing God. We're sealed together forever through all eternity. The spirit will be with you. I feel like the spirit would be with me if I got married in the temple and stuff. It would be stronger because I felt like I'm doing what God wants me to do.
Right. Right. I know that the church is very, very adamant about if when
the young couples when they get married, they try to encourage them to
have their, have a temple wedding. But in order for
[END OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE B]
Well I was just mentioning to you a second ago about the temple recommend. You have to have a temple recommend from your bishop, and it just seems that everything is just so organized, and you were telling me that you like organized churches. Yeah. Tell me a little bit about the church's stance on when there aren't a lot of African Americans within the church. Like if an African American person was to join do they, does the church try to match you up with another African American person, or how do they feel about intermarriage? Like when a single person comes into the church or when they counsel the youth the young, not the youth but young adults, and they counsel them like a premarriage counseling type of thing and they get new members and they're single. Do they counsel them in the way to try to match them up with someone of their own race or do they feel comfortable? How does the church feel about—
Mixed marriages.
Right, mixed marriages.
Well as far as I know they don't, they're not against it. They would prefer you to marry your own race, but if you decide to marry outside your race, they don't knock it.
Would you say that they would prefer you and your mate remain, that the two of you be Mormons even if one was black and one was white or that you marry the two of you be of the same race even if one was in another church?
I think they would prefer if one were white and one were black and be both Mormon. They would prefer it that way yeah.
They would. That's, it seems to be a prevailing controversy for different people's views regarding whether or not they would prefer if both of the couples be of the same race or one be of one race and one be another as long as the both of them are the same faith. Because I've often heard myself that coming from church leaders' authority that they really would prefer that the two, the couples both are of the same faith in the Mormon church. I think the reason for that is is because there's a, it's easy for the non-Mormon to convert the Mormon probably maybe there's a potential. Like if you were to marry someone outside of your faith, there's a potential that that person could get you to convert back to their—
Right. Right.
So maybe the bishop would probably would feel more comfortable if both were Mormon.
Right.
Yeah. Does prayer play an important role in your life?
Yes.
Tell me a little bit about how, why prayer is so important to you and what you see the benefits of prayer.
Because me being by myself and having no one, well I have got the church. I'm really not by myself because I have got the church. I mean any time I need help or anything someone will come.
That's good.
Prayer had, me being alone I have to pray often, and I feel like God protection is around me while I'm here by myself. So prayer is very, very important to me.
Right. Right. Gee I had something on my mind I was going to ask. What are some of your favorite, the favorite passages that you like in the Bible and some of your favorite songs that you sing in the church?
I Know My Redeemer Lives is my favorite song in the
Mormon. Yeah. My favorite passage in the Bible is John where
‘let not your heart be troubled.’ That one.
Right. Now when you went to the Pentecostal Holiness tradition and when you went to the Baptist churches, you know that there's a difference in the way that those churches are from the Mormon church. Wherein those two churches the pastor gets up and he preaches, but in the Mormon church the bishop will get up and talk and he'll have someone else talk.
Yeah. The person that speaks—it used to be three speakers, and they already had a week notice or two-week notice.
To go up and say something.
To get their together.
Now—
They give them a topic to speak on.
Oh okay. Tell me I had some people to say to me that what they miss in the Mormon church is that fire that they get—
Oh yeah.
In the Baptist church—
That burning.
Feeling touched, yeah. Do you ever feel like you miss that in the Mormon church that you wish that that was there?
I don't miss it. I mean we have our way of praising God. But we are just not as out, not as charismatic about it like. I really don't miss it. I went to church with one of the ladies up stairs. I went to church with her one Sunday, well one Saturday, and all of a sudden I was up praising with that—
This was a Baptist church.
No. I think her church was a Pentecostal church or a non-denominational one.
This was just recently.
It was about three months ago. Well no, I don't miss it bcause I just I like the quietness of the Mormon church.
It is pretty quiet and laid back, and they're not as expressive.
Right and it makes it more reverent.
Now when you—tell me a little bit more about that experience that you had when you went to—
I was up praising, audible praises with along with everybody else. I felt pretty good. I felt that warm sensation.
You felt like you were being touched by the.
Um hmm.
Did you feel like it made you be more expressive?
Um hmm.
Like you couldn't be in the Mormon Church.
Um hmm.
Right. Right. That's interesting.
I think the spirit just hit me because I wasn't even thinking about the people around me. I was an ordained minister.
Oh tell me a little bit about that.
Yeah I was, I was before I became a member, before I left the church—
The Mormon.
Yeah, before I left the Pentecostal church I was an ordained minister. But like I said I got disillusioned with the way things were going in the church, and they way people were doing crookedness and all that stuff. Hypocrisy, a lot of hypocrisy I just got disillusioned with it and I just left.
Was that just that one particular church or—
Well, it was a lot of, not only that church other churches—
Were the same way.
Right.
Were you ever a pastor of any church?
I wasn't a pastor just an ordained minister.
Oh. Where did you get your ordination from?
Franklin—
Franklington.
In the Church of Jesus Christ, not Church of Jesus Christ, what was the name of that church? I can't think of the name of it.
Okay.
Apostolic House of Prayer.
Okay. What are the things that a person has to do to become an ordained minister? I guess maybe I'm interested in wanting to know that because I'm getting ready to apply to go to Duke Divinity School.
Oh. That's wonderful.
Yeah. Yeah. But I don't feel led to be a minister.
I'm going for they have a two-year program,
Master's of Theological Studies. Ultimately I'd
like to teach either in a seminary or at a community college or a
four-year college. I'd like to teach about history of
religions, black church history or just teach
Well, the way I did it, like I said I felt this burning of the spirit leading me to I guess leading me to, I felt it was leading me to become a minister because like I said I saw so much wrong. People would teach the Gospel that were teaching everything but the Gospel. So I felt like the Lord was leading me to teach what was right. That's how I felt. I went to my pastor, and I told him about it, and the next thing I know he well he told me that the Lord was calling me to preach.
Right.
To preach the Gospel. So it was a long time before I accepted it, but I finally accepted it.
Did you have to take any classes or is it—
No because, as far as the Bible was concerned I know it from back to the front. I know it. But I did take a course at the theological seminary at Southeastern in Wake Forest. I did take a course there.
Okay. Okay. Was that so that you could become ordained or—
No, in fact it was after I became ordained when I took that course.
Oh okay. So once you became ordained were you in getting ready to have your own church?
No, I wasn't going for anything like that because I didn't feel like that was what God wanted me to have my own church.
You just wanted to minister to people that you came into contact with.
Right. The true Gospel yeah.
Right. Okay, well did you, had you ever told your bishop?
Oh yeah. He knows. Yeah, he knows.
Really, and what was his, what was his comments?