Much has changed for LDS blacks since '78

At the time, and unbeknownst to most church members, groups of black Africans had organized their own version of the LDS Church after writing to church headquarters and asking for literature. Gray would learn much about African interest in church membership from LaMar Williams, who had been called by President David O. McKay to go to Africa and meet with those groups.

After visiting the continent and meeting with the "Saints," none of whom had been baptized in any official sense, Williams estimated there were between 300 and 400 of them, meeting in designated worship spots and continually seeking more information and support from Salt Lake City. At that point, in 1964, the church had approximately 2.5 million members.

Because the church does not record race as part of its membership records, there is no official count on the current number of black Latter-day Saints, but some have estimated it may be as high as 500,000, based on general population percentages and conversion rates in Africa and Brazil.

BYU sociologist Cardell Jacobsen, who has researched ethnicity within the LDS Church, told a group of students at Utah Valley State College this spring that in talking with his students, they believe Utahns "tend to be pretty naive about race" and the challenges black Latter-day Saints in particular still face.

"We don't know how to interact with African Americans and sometimes other groups," he said. "We still ask stupid questions that would not be asked in other areas," and there is evidence that prejudice persists in Utah and America at large.

In recent interviews with trans-racially adopted children and their parents about their experience with race, "without exception, any child over 5 or 6 years old has heard the 'n-word.'. Parents report they have heard lots of nasty and ugly things," he said. Even so, he is optimistic that at some future day, race will fade away as an issue.

Gray, who travels regularly to speak with LDS groups and share a recent documentary film he and co-producer Margaret Young made regarding black LDS history, said he also hopes for the day that race is no longer an issue. But he is still dismayed at the number of people who hang on to old LDS folklore that said blacks were "fence-sitters" in what Latter-day Saints believe was a pre-existent war in heaven between Satan and Christ, or "cursed because Ham saw his father, Noah, naked."

He cried tears of joy in April 2006, when President Gordon B. Hinckley addressed lingering racial hatred within the church during the priesthood session of general conference.