To see Cal Grondahl’s cartoon that goes with this post, go here
Tired of repeat Go Fish games, I was shamefacedly teaching my younger daughter how to play poker. I didn’t have much success; she kept giggling when I tried to explain what a “flush” is.
What’s interesting is my first instinct was to use Rook cards — the ones with a bird — to teach her a variation of poker. I couldn’t find any in the home although I’ve seen them around. Rook cards, you could once find a deck in every active Mormon’s home. I grew up with them and we played “gin rummy” with Rook cards on many family home evening nights. It got me wondering: Are playing cards still mostly banned in LDS homes? We have a deck; although rarely used, I finally used it for the poker game with the daughter … I stressed no gambling!
Growing up, conventional playing cards were banned in my home. We only used Rook. One only had to open up “Mormon Doctrine” to see why my parents banned the cards. It reads, “Members of the Church should not belong to bridge or other type of card clubs, and they should neither play cards nor have them in their homes. By cards is meant, of course, the spotted face cards used by gamblers. To the extent that church members play cards they are out of harmony with their inspired leaders. Innocent non-gambling games played with other types of cards, except for the waste of time in many instances, are not objectionable.”
Other LDS sources have been a bit more moderate on the issue, describing cards as “time-wasters” that can be dangerous since they can lead to gambling. In a New Era article from 1984, author Boyd R. Thomas explained that in the days prior to television, cards were considered a time-waster that could lead to addiction, and perhaps, a gambling obsession. The article includes this 1939 quote from then-President Joseph F. Smith, published in “Gospel Doctrine:” While a simple game of cards in itself may be harmless, it is a fact that by immoderate repetition it ends in an infatuation for chance schemes, in habits of excess, in waste of precious time, in dulling and stupor of the mind, and in the complete destruction of religious feeling. … There is the grave danger that lurks in persistent card playing, which begets the spirit of gambling, of speculation and that awakens the dangerous desire to get something for nothing.”
The LDS Church has long opposed gambling, and with its influence one can expect that the lottery will never come to Utah. In the November 1972 Ensign, Dallin H. Oaks, then president of BYU and today a church apostle, penned an article titled “The Evils of Gambling.” Referring to gambling, he wrote, “We therefore advise and urge all members of the Church to refrain from participation in any activity which is contrary to the view herein set forth.” That would presumably include playing with traditional playing cards.
It’s my guess that most active Mormons likely take a dim view of cards, even if they are not using them to gamble. There remains a strong traditional disapproval of traditional cards. In fact, Rook was invented by game companies for the express purpose of meeting the game-playing needs of fundamentalist protestants who objected to traditional cards. I’m sure that sales to Mormons were counted by Rook makers in the second half of the 20th century. According to pagat.com, there is also a similar set of cards, called the Kvitlech cards, used by certain Jews in Central Europe who are forbidden to use standard cards.
This column also ran in Currents, the Standard-Examiner’s digital-only section on politics and culture. For more information on Currents, call 801-625-4400.
Al
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 4:02 am:
I thank my God that in the Mormon home that I was raised in we woke up every Christmas morning to the sound of my dad shuffling playing cards so we could all play crazy eights before opening presents while mother finished getting ready. We also played cards during camping trips, to decide where we wanted to go out to eat, and even what chores were to be given to whom (appropriately titled “Games for Jobs”). It brought unity to our family and to my knowledge non of my parents’ six kids have purchased a lottery ticket or stepped into a casino (except for the buffet).
Do Mormons really ban playing cards from the home? – El Estándar (blog) | DepositCasino.net
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 6:00 am:
[...] Do Mormons really ban playing cards from the home?El Estándar (blog)Innocent non-gambling games played with other types of cards, except for the waste of time in many instances, are not objectionable. … [...]
CB
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 7:12 am:
My grandfather, rest his soul, was the last surviving Sons of Utah Pioneers (he was literally a son of a utah pioneer, whose father was a polygamist and over 80 when my grandfather was born LOL) and a temple Mormon and loved playing Pinochle. I think people need to be careful not to get wrapped up in worrying about potential evils – and pay attention to the actual evils they commit every day.
That’s not to say it’s wise to waste time and certainly gambling can lead to a lot of unhappiness in life… but … any leisure activity can turn into gambling. Why pick on cards.
Al
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 7:26 am:
[ I'm not sure who the Al is up there at post #1, but it's a different Al than I am. ]
BobBecker
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 8:18 am:
As a non-LDS person only arrived in Utah eight years ago, this “no cards in Mormon homes” business is news to me. Never heard that one before. What’s even stranger to me is the assumption that card-playing [even with the less-evil non-gambler decks like Rook, etc.] is necessarily “wasting time” and more or less sinful. Beginning to look like Mormons ought to be counted among the Puritans, who were defined once as people who lived with the terrible fear that someone somewhere was having a good time.
Do — or did — Mormons extend that to argue that all time spent at play, at recreation, is necessarily wasted time and therefor slightly sinful?
My grandfather, Italian immigrant to the US along with several of his brothers, used to pay cards with his brothers in the old farmhouse in Brooklyn I grew up in. And they gambled! [penny ante poker]. They’d arrive after dinner on a Saturday night, sit at the kitchen table, drink a little wine and for a couple of hours play… and talk. Reminisce. Politics. The old country. Family news. The grandkids. It was recreation for them [they worked hard at physical jobs], and family time for them as well, and it’ll be a liberal day in Provo before anyone convinces me it was either sinful, dangerous or a waste of time.
Were I of a discriminatory turn of mind — happily, I’m not. I’m a liberal — stories like this about Mormons banning card decks as evil and card playing [recreation] as sinfully wasteful would go a fair way to convince me Mormons were… well, fanatics. Lighten up, guys. Recreation is a good thing, as are most things in moderation not carried to extremes. Sitting on the front porch of a summer evening watching the setting sun light up the western face of the Wasatch with a nice bourbon rocks in hand, for example. Like god intended….
Dean Moriarty
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 8:24 am:
Do you realize what you have done Doug? Now some halfbrained legislator is going to introduce a bill to ban playing cards in the home. It will be needed the legislator will say because of the evils of gambling. Think about the innocent children introduced to this evil. The broken homes, the loss of selfworth, the degeratioin and embarassement to families. This will just be the first step in some child not going on a mission or staying out late at night. It is a moral imperative to stop this evil now before it spreads. Yes Doug thats what teaching children how to play cards will start/. Stop playing cards now. Ah yes I can barely wait until some Utah County legislator introduces a bill to ban playing cards/
Duwayne Anderson
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 10:11 am:
Defining what is or is not acceptable in Mormonism is tough — because Mormonism is an ever-changing religion. What Mormonism teaches today, and what it taught 100 years ago are often very different things.
When I was growing up in the LDS Church (during the 60s and 70s) Blacks were not allowed to marry in the temple or hold the priesthood. Women could not pray in sacrament meetings or wear pants in the chapel. The church worked tirelessly against the equal rights amendment. Drinking coke was a no-no, plural marriage was still thought of as something the saints would re-engage in the future. And, yes, playing cards was verboten.
LDS opposition to cards probably grew out of comments made by “prophets, seers, and revelators” like Brigham Young. Here’s an interesting link that has quotations from diaries of Mormon pioneers on the subject.
http://historytogo.utah.gov/salt_lake_tribune/mormon_trail_series/052897.html
Mormonism today is a very different religion from days gone by. I once commented to a young LDS girl that the Church used to prohibit Blacks from holding the priesthood and marrying in the temple. She said “that’s a lie that has been made up by antimormons.”
Amazing.
I imagine a lot of Mormons reading this post will respond in the same way — blithely ignorant of the legacy of their sad, sad religion.
Duwayne Anderson
Author of “Farewell to Eden: Coming to terms with Mormonism and science”
BobBecker
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 10:32 am:
DA:
You wrote: “Mormonism is an ever-changing religion. What Mormonism teaches today, and what it taught 100 years ago are often very different things.”
You could make the same statement, I think, of very nearly every modern faith in the US provided you extended the time beyond one century. My Mom has a list of teachings and practices of the Catholic Church [to which she is still an adherent] which have changed just in her lifetime [92 years and counting]. Even I can remember when Baptists were the staunchest defenders of separation of Church and state, because they remembered their own history as a faith that had been discriminated against by law from the very founding days of the Republic. [They seem to mostly have forgotten that history now.]
Mormonism, Anglicanism, Catholicism, Islam, Baptism…. kind of hard to find a modern American faith that hasn’t changed its tune and doctrines over time….
D. Michael
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 10:42 am:
The logic behind the ban is absurd and spurious. By the same logic, watching NFL football games should be banned. It’s certainly a waste of time, and it could easily lead to gambling, because lots of people use NFL football games for gambling.
In fact, just about any recreational activity could be labeled a waste of time, and certainly someone somewhere has to have used every one of them for gambling at some point in time. Even Monopoly was corrupted in the movie “Friday the 13th” when the kids in the film played strip Monopoly–which surely qualifies as a form of gambling. And can there be any greater time waster than Monopoly–a game that goes on and on and never really has a specific ending, except that everyone runs out of money when one player drives them all to bankruptcy? What kind of terrible immoral lesson does such a game teach?
The logic behind this ban is of the same idiotic quality as what I heard Pat Robertson utter one day while surfing cable TV and coming across the “700 Club.” According to him, the movie “Mary Poppins” is of the devil because it has magiuc in it–i.e. witchcraft.
Michael Trujillo
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 10:47 am:
How many LDS houses that don’t contain a deck of cards DO have a Play Station 3 and/or a Wii?
And, in these households, you can spend hours watching youtube videos of people acting obnoxiously, but heaven help you if you play some computer solitaire?
????????
Seth R.
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 11:12 am:
This is an old cultural scruple that was once pushed by LDS leadership, but is pretty-much ignored today. Back the 1970s there were some stern warnings about not having face cards in your home that had a bit of play. My own father (who converted as an adult to the LDS Church in the 70s) banned face cards from his home and we weren’t allowed to play with them as kids.
My dad has since relented and doesn’t seem to care much and a lot of Mormons I grew up with didn’t seem to care about the prohibitions either. Today, you’ll only find some of the older generation of Mormons who still enforce or follow this rule. The vast majority of anyone born after 1980 in the LDS Church don’t see much wrong with face cards at all. Playing poker with Skittles was a regular feature of the Mormon Boy Scout campouts I went on.
I don’t really care, and neither do most of the Mormons I know.
It’s mainly a historical relic.
Mark Hansen
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 11:50 am:
I grew up in a family where face cards were not allowed. We never lacked for other ways to “waste our time”. We also played all of the evil games with rook or other cards.
If that’s a sin, then I’m in real trouble, because now as a grownup, I collect and play “Magic: The Gathering” cards, with it’s myriad of unholy monsters. my sons, too, as well as Yu-Gi-Oh and Pokemon.
I even went so far as to create a collectible card game, as yet unpublished, based on the scriptures: http://www.facebook.com/chapterandversegame
Sylvia
on Jul 30th, 2010
@ 12:38 pm:
This is just one example of why every LDS person should know the McConkie’s book was just that: McConkie’s book and NOT the doctrine of the LDS church.
I also think it’s very important that people distinguish between doctrine and recommended practices. The warnings about playing cards were more about how we spend our time than the cards themselves. You’ll notice that these days, most conference speakers do not get into such specifics; rather, they teach the general concept and hope we’ll apply it accordingly.
Tom
on Jul 31st, 2010
@ 11:51 am:
Doug
Damn man, I sometimes learn some pretty interesting stuff from your blog and editorials, and you don’t even charge tuition! Thanks.
I grew up in a Mormon home in the forties and fifties, have been pretty constant in in studying Mo history since and have never ever heard of this card banning biz. I also just spent 15 minutes researching the subject in my “Mormon Encyclopedia” and could find no mention of it.
Perhaps this is something that came to be fashionable after the fifties when I “fell away” from being active in the Church? Or perhaps it could have been a regional phenom?
By the way, there seems to be a problem with your comment box here. When I reach the end of a line and the cursor goes to the next, there is maybe five or six spaces that seem to get lost on the screen before the copy picks up again.
Curt
on Jul 31st, 2010
@ 5:55 pm:
Fascinating…I’d always been taught that the opposition to the use of face cards was due to the suits being derived from tarot cards. I can see the logic of the decision, though…as a group that’s dedicated to trying to better the lives of all of its adherents, doctrinal decisions kind of have to be made with the ‘weakest link’ in mind. No, not everyone who learns to play poker is going to wind up a gambling addict…but there’s no knowing who will until it’s too late.
Everyone who’s got such a hostile take about the ‘controlling nature’ of Mormon leaders should step back, take a deep breath, and ask themselves just why in the world they care so much about something that they don’t believe in. Is it really worth expending the energy to castigate people who are trying to do what they think is right, when it’s not doing any harm to you?
Jim W
on Jul 31st, 2010
@ 6:36 pm:
I remember not having playing cards in the house growing up, and there was probably a bit of the exotic “something we don’t do” to it.
I couldn’t tell you if we had a deck in the house today, though I did finally give up and give in to my Spider Solitaire addiction. I don’t have any interest in gambling, but as a mindless time-waster, it’s there. But so is Farmville
The warnings about how we spend our leisure time continue; Elder Bednar gave some very specific counsel against certain computer-based activities not too long ago. In today’s Grand Theft Auto age, face cards are the least of our worries.
Nevada Smith
on Aug 1st, 2010
@ 9:11 am:
Curt and Jim…very good posts…you get it…the brethren are once again just trying to guide us in a way that helps us to be free from unnecessary burdens…like Bob’s bourbon….
No one forces anyone to do anything in the teachings….my Dad who was not a member would sit for hours with head phones on and play solitaire….mind numbing, wasted time…..an Episcopal Minister and his wife would have two drinks…that’s all…just two before dinner…they decided one day to see how their life would change, if they quit the “two drink” game….they discovered that they had been bantering with each other, felt much better in a healthy way and would be more positively active without the drinks….the Brethren are truly guided…their messages are not for control…they do want us to enjoy life to its fullest….there are no other folks as involved in good entertainment as the Mormons…..they are just trying to free us from burdens….Hey Bob…invite the missionaries in…it’ll open up a whole new world…promise!
ScottH
on Aug 2nd, 2010
@ 9:19 am:
I grew up in a very active LDS home in the 60s and 70s. My folks were fairly strict, but Dad was an intellectual. He drew distinct lines between actual church doctrine and personal interpretations by general authorities. The former was essential while the latter was to be considered and individually applied with care. (Dad never did quite see eye-to-eye with Elder McConkie.)
Mom & Dad were also sold on the doctrine of continuing revelation. The living prophet gave counsel that was applicable to us at that point in time. Joseph F. Smith’s instructions about playing cards applied specifically to the people of his day. That does not necessarily negate the usefulness of the counsel decades later. But conditions change, so current counsel is always most important. Otherwise, what is the use of living prophets?
I had a couple of youth leaders that tried to convince me that playing cards were among the most evil things on the face of the earth. But we had playing cards (and even poker chips) in the house. I dabbled as an amateur magician back in those days, and cards were an important part of the act. None of us has grown up to be gamblers or necromancers. Also, playing cards are pretty benign by the standards of today’s video games.
That brings up another point. We used to spend oodles of time playing card and board games when I was a kid. This engendered a lot of close interaction with friends and family members. It seems like this kind of activity is far rarer today. Instead, people are involved with online gaming where there is little face-to-face interaction. Maybe playing cards aren’t such a bad thing in our current cultural paradigm.
Mark Saal
on Aug 2nd, 2010
@ 1:10 pm:
Thanks for the timely info, Doug et al. We’ve got a ward party coming up and I’m in charge of the Game Night. (ix-nay on the ackjack-blay, eh?) Hmmm, so then, how about Ouija Boards? Are they kosher in the church? We could call it “Ouard Ouija Board Night.”
Charles Trentelman
on Aug 2nd, 2010
@ 4:50 pm:
You could draw a line on the ground in front of the door to the ward house, Mark, and say that line represents the Utah/Nevada line.
Everyone crossing it would then be free to use playing cards, just like in real life!
Tricia
on Aug 2nd, 2010
@ 8:39 pm:
I haven’t heard of playing cards being bad. It depends on how they are used.
Mark- I doubt the bishop of your ward would approve of that. He shouldn’t. When I was in high school a kid brought one to class one day. I was shocked that the teacher didn’t do anything about it. It was a really creepy feeling that day. There are so many group games out there that don’t require playing cards such as apples to apples and balderdash.
Daniel
on Aug 3rd, 2010
@ 2:57 pm:
Playing cards weren’t banned in my home, but Rook was definitely encouraged. Wasting time and gambling were viewed dimly. Some of my former girlfriend’s (current wife’s) college roomates were morally opposed to playing cards, so we generally used Rook or Phase Ten cards when playing games with them. My wife and I currently use playing cards.
Steve-O
on Aug 9th, 2010
@ 12:11 am:
I’m from one of those families where cards were once verboten and eventually found their way into the house. I can live without cards. But manufactured hocus-pocus about their mystical powers only worked to undermine my faith. Sylvia is probably right that this is all about McConkie’s book.
Ugh, I’m thinking of banning that book from my house.
To be fair, Spencer W. Kimball spoke on this matter. A quick google search finds several hostile websites mentioning the 1st sentence of the following quote:
“We hope faithful Latter-day Saints will not use the playing cards which are used for gambling, either with or without the gambling. As for the gambling, in connection with horse racing or games or sports, we firmly discourage such things.”
No hocus-pocus here.
Gambling was & continues to be a bad idea. I’m grateful to my parents for teaching me that lesson. They told me that best case scenario, it teaches us to rely on the shaky foundation of dumb luck. Worst case scenario, you’ll lose a ton of money.
The advice to avoid wasting time is well-taken & hardly controversial. Growing up in Berkeley I knew several liberal atheist parents who wouldn’t allow us kids to play video games, calling them a waste of time. They were right.
Cards can create an unnecessary temptation to gamble. Even when not used to gamble, they still tempt. It’s like buying a 12 pack of cheap beer for cooking & then storing 11 unused cans it in the basement. Although I’d probably have the willpower to resist drinking them, the kids might get curious.
When we received a set of cards as a gift, they were accepted graciously. We even sometimes use them. Absent the culture of gambling, I can’t see a problem with them. Shoot, in my day people were far more likely to gamble with dominos. Scott’s right, cards can been used to facilitate fellowship.
Tori
on Aug 12th, 2010
@ 6:49 pm:
I am LDS (a Mormon) and I love playing Poker. I try to follow the religious counsel of no gambling by playing poker as you would any other game…with nothing on the line except for fun. I don’t feel guilty owning face cards and playing with them.
I think it is the spirit of the religious instruction rather than avoiding face cards all together that matters. It isn’t contrary to the church to have a good time or play Go Fish or the like. Why would it be against the church teachings to play a game of Poker without the financial gambling?
By the way, I have met several families that don’t allow them in their homes. It is not ALL Mormon families, but there are some that ban them because of their understanding of church instruction. All faiths have some people that go to extreme levels and some that live it according to their understanding and personal feelings. I think this is one of those matters.
Julie
on Aug 25th, 2010
@ 7:56 pm:
I have wondered about where exactly I stand on the face cards thing. I remember throwing all my face cards away as a teenager in 1983. But before that, I was playing once with my friend at age 12, and we were using face cards. We flipped the cards all over the family room floor, and then tried to “devine” what a certain card was by puting our hands on the card and closing our eyes. We invited evil spirits, and were able to tell what the cards were!! We had the most terrifying feeling in the room, and we were home alone. We were almost crying when my friend’s parents got home. I believe the use of face cards for tarot cards and other evil practices invites evil spirits, and so I don’t like to have the cards in my house.