Ancestry baptisms of the deceased

tarklequest · Post by **tarklequest** » 21 Jan 2009 08:27

I have heard a rumour (and I can only call it that as I have no proof) that Ancestry like you to put your family trees on their website and that they use those trees to baptise the deceased people listed into their church (presumably the Latter Day Saints).
Can anyone tell me any more about this....is it true or is it just one of those false rumours that do the rounds from time to time.
Many thanks.

ID:3377

ChrisBowyer · Post by **ChrisBowyer** » 21 Jan 2009 08:31

The LDS certainly baptise the deceased, that's the whole point of the IGI... It seems the more ancestors you have in Heaven the more likely you are to get in. Ancestry (and all the other sites I've seen) promise no one can see your tree unless you explicitly allow it.

YouTube · Post by **Jane** » 22 Jan 2009 07:51

I suspect if a member of the LDS used your research to add to their own tree they might then baptise people from your research. Looking at the wikipedia/Baptism_for_the_dead seems to imply you need to do a church service, so I doubt that wholesale baptisms are likely.

tarklequest · Post by **tarklequest** » 22 Jan 2009 13:25

Many thanks for your replies. What concerns me is another member of my extended family has their tree on Ancestry on public display. If I were to furnish them with information about my branch and it appears on Ancestry as a public display then would they be used to be baptised. I know that such an event would upset quite a number of my ancestors. It seems there is no conclusive answer to this question so far.

ChrisBowyer · Post by **ChrisBowyer** » 22 Jan 2009 14:57

It doesn't make any difference whether you publish your family tree or not.

All the information necessary for anyone in the world to postumously perform any pseudo-religious ceremony they like, is already a matter of public record (indeed not even that, there are plenty of 'Mrs Mary Smith's and the like on their records, presumably taken from the original baptism of one of her children).

In fact it's fairly likely that some of your ancestors are also the ancestors of living Mormons, so they really have as much right as we do to decide whose heaven we would like to believe they've gone to.

It's also worth remembering that without the Mormons' long-standing obsession with identifying and re-baptising their ancestors, we would have lost an enormous amount of genealogical information, or only be able to see it by appointment at the records office with white gloves on.

tarklequest · Post by **tarklequest** » 29 Jan 2009 09:12

Point taken Chris.

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