The Deseret News writes today, “The Catholic Church has ordered dioceses across the globe not to give information in parish registers to members of The Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints.” This is a very painful blow not only to the LDS church but to genealogists everywhere. For decades the LDS church has been microfilming every record possible
and preserving those records in a secured granite vault in the mountains outside of Salt Lake City. This effort helps to ensure those records are preserved for future generations.
As technology has advanced many of those records have become available online. All of the records have always been available to anyone, LDS or not, so that they could research their ancestry.
There are religious differences at the heart of this move, but it seems like those differences could be worked out. FamilySearch.org has been a great resource for many years
now and is enjoyed by anyone with access to the Internet. In more recent years companies like Geni.com and MyFamily.com have shown that genealogy is not the boring realm
of old people with nothing better to do, but an engaging activity enjoyed by family members young and old. The preservation of the lineage of mankind and access to that precious
information seem like such worthwhile endeavours that surely both parties can reach an accord.
If not then we have just witnessed a genealogical nuclear bomb.