Genesis Group: How 3 faith-filled men began the Black American member movement in the Church!
Eugene Orr, second counselor of Genesis Group, is pictured during the first meeting of
Genesis Group. Church History Library
Laurel Schmitke's step grandfather was a founding member of the Genesis Group.
Adapted excerpt of an essay from “My Lord, He Calls Me: Stories of Faith by Black American Latter-day Saints” Eugene Orr February 25, 2023 08:00 AM MST
Editor’s note:
Eugene Orr is a founding member of Genesis Group and was the second counselor in the first Genesis Group presidency.
Born a Southern Baptist, Eugene moved to Utah as an adult. It was here where he met Lei, a White Latter-day Saint who introduced him to the missionaries. In their first meeting, the missionaries taught Eugene the first and second missionary lessons; they also made some hurtful comments about Blacks. But Eugene knew through the Spirit those comments weren’t true, and so he remained curious and continued to learn about the gospel. Lei introduced Eugene to another Black member of the Church named Darius Gray, and together they discussed the Church’s racial restrictions. Afterward, Eugene asked himself if he believed in the gospel of Jesus Christ...
Contributed By: Margaret Blair Young - October 25, 2016
African American LDS activist Eugene Orr was born on March 16, 1946, to David Orr and Martha Wilder Orr in Ashburn, Georgia. The family was deeply religious and planned for young Orr to become a minister. As a child, Orr would sometimes put corn silk into bottle tops to form his congregation and would preach to his imaginary listeners.
In 1968 Orr came west through his participation in the Job Corps program at Thiokol Hill Air Force Base in Clearfield, Utah. It was there that he became acquainted with members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the most influential being Leitha Marintha Derricott, a white woman with a deep heritage in the faith, who arranged to have LDS missionaries teach him. When Orr asked about the LDS doctrine of denying priesthood and temple privileges to all of visible African descent, one of these missionaries assured him that he need not worry about it as he would become white when he became more righteous...
