The 1947 correspondence between Lowry Nelson, Heber Weeks, and the First Presidency of the Church is rather infamous for the First Presidency repeating the (false) claim the Priesthood/Temple restriction originated with Joseph Smith and other beliefs. There are other things we learn in this correspondence, such as:
Bigoted Attitudes towards Roman Catholicism in the 1940s
Lowry Nelson, letter to Heber Weeks, June 26, 1947, p. 1:
In reference to Catholicism, while
the Cubans are nominally Roman Catholic, they take the religion rather lightly.
Wherever I went, I asked rural people about the church and invariably they told
me that they saw the priest only once a year, when he came around to baptism
the babies at $3.00 per head; like branding the calves at the annual roundup.
Some families have crucifixes and other paraphernalia in their homes and carry
on something of the ancient ritual, but my impression is that it means little
to most of them.
First Presidency teaching that any social benefits of the Gospel are only “incidental”
The First Presidency (George Albert Smith, J. Reuben Clark, Jr.,
and David O. McKay), letter to Lowry Nelson, July 17, 1947, p. 1
We make this initial remark: the
social side of the Restored Gospel is only an incident of it; it is not the end
thereof.
