Is Family History Research Required?

[EllenMaksoud]

In doing Family History research I have discovered things that are not suitable for others to know, and will go no further with it. Is this research required?

[Calm]

No, though they like you to have done four generations, including I think oneself so back to great grandparents.  I am thinking they do that so as to allow the greatest amount of connection with other families with the least amount of work.  Most people can do this without having to go into anything beyond checking with the family, I'm guessing.

[rpn]

Everybody finds unsavory things in their ancestor's  backgrounds (heck most of us have such unsavory things in our own backgrounds, though they may not be public enough to ever reach the light of day).   Everything you input about living persons cannot be accessed by anyone but you.  (Any siblings/children can, of course, input themselves and for those who are dead can link up with the overall records, but information about live people is not shared.)  And since the 1940 census is available already,  there is now public info about many living people anyway.   

 

Turning the hearts of the children to their fathers is part of the great work of God.   While it is true that it is hard to deal with the ugliness that people sometimes do, it is also the right of descendants to know their ancestors to the extent that they choose to do so.   I'm not sure how hiding things helps anyone    Seems to me that trying to figure out why and avoid those traps makes more sense.

 

But, the only people who are likely to be upset with you for not doing your family history are those who are your ancestors who want their gospel ordinances done, and if they are the ones who did awful things they should surely understand (though those who might have been their victims or had to endure the results of their bad choices might hope that they can also have access to the saving ordinances that can make them whole.)

Edited October 13, 2013 by rpn

[rpn]

And we are NEVER required to run faster than we have strength.  So shouldas don't apply when we cannot personally deal with whatever it is we aren't doing.

[JLHPROF]

In doing Family History research I have discovered things that are not suitable for others to know, and will go no further with it. Is this research required?

 

Is the actual research required - maybe, maybe not.  With all gospel principles we each progress at our own pace.

But here are some teachings I would always consider before giving up on doing family history:

 

"these are principles in relation to the dead and the living that cannot be lightly passed over, as pertaining to our salvation. For their [the dead’s] salvation is necessary and essential to our salvation, as Paul says concerning the fathers—that they without us cannot be made perfect—neither can we without our dead be made perfect. (D&C 128:15)" - Joseph Smith

 

"The living cannot be made perfect without the dead, nor the dead be made perfect without the living. There has got to be a welding together and a joining together of parents and children and children and parents until the whole chain of God's family shall be welded together into one chain, and they shall all become the family of God and His Christ."  - Joseph F. Smith

 

"Will not a man who keeps the commandments of the Lord, who is faithful and true so far as he himself is concerned, receive perfection? Yes, provided his worthy dead also receive the same privileges, because there must be a family organization, a family unit, and each generation must be linked to the chain that goes before in order to bring perfection in family organization. Thus eventually we will be one large family with Adam at the head, Michael, the archangel, presiding over his posterity...." Joseph Fielding Smith Doctrines of Salvation, 2:175-176

 

There are eternal blessings related to our own personal salvation that come from Family History work.  No one can really be saved as an independent entity.

Edited October 13, 2013 by JLHPROF

[The Nehor]

I found out the family trees of my parents link up at the third generation. Only one set of grandparents. This makes family history easy for me and no real downside.

[CV75]

In doing Family History research I have discovered things that are not suitable for others to know, and will go no further with it. Is this research required?

Just share what you want to, but it's good to have the temple work done for your ancestors. The level of information required for ordinance work is minimal. The research is required if there is no other way for you to identify your ancestors, and as they say, "somebody has to do it."

 

If reconnecting or sharing this information with those still living is not suitable in this lifetime for one reason or another, try not to let it affect the work for the dead. My probem is that relatives won't share their research with me because they don't want me to do the temple work!

[mfbukowski]

The one answer that always works in this church is "follow the spirit and act accordingly".  Never ever do anything which seems not right to you.

 

But keep praying about it, and the answer you get may change as you grow in the gospel, and understand that those on the other side need your love too, as hard as it may be to give to them.

 

Whatever they have done, they need your forgiveness and a chance to hear the gospel, and you may be their only link.

[mfbukowski]

Just share what you want to, but it's good to have the temple work done for your ancestors. The level of information required for ordinance work is minimal. The research is required if there is no other way for you to identify your ancestors, and as they say, "somebody has to do it."

 

If reconnecting or sharing this information with those still living is not suitable in this lifetime for one reason or another, try not to let it affect the work for the dead. My probem is that relatives won't share their research with me because they don't want me to do the temple work!

In a hundred years, when they are on the other side, that may change.  Clearly they did the research to pass on to their kids- presumably.  It will all work out eventually. 

 

Time is the great equalizer- we all go eventually.

Edited October 14, 2013 by mfbukowski

[Storm Rider]

Hello Ellen,

 

I have been an active genealogist for some fourteen years; I work on family history almost daily (it is my hobby and I spend more free time with it than anything else).  Some treat family history as something to hide or to protect; the actions of one's ancestors is viewed as having a personal reflection on their own self-value.  At one family reunion I remember some distant cousins reviewing my research and found things that made them uncomfortable and they left with bad feelings.  They felt ashamed of their grandfather's actions and were committed to keeping this episode private.

 

I learned that my ancestors were as human as I was and their history is part of my story.  I have a first cousin who murdered his father; my twice great grandmother never married had several children that all took her last name; slave owners, several polygamist relatives in the south (non-LDS), my grandfather's brothers went to prison after defending my grandfather in a fight - they killed the county doctor who pulled the gun, but was a poor shot, and many children out-of-wedlock.  I could go on for quite some time, but the truth is that each of these people did the best they could with the circumstances given them.  Some chose badly at times, but they also chose well at other times.  My family has fought in every war the US has ever engaged in; they fought on both sides of the Civil War, and a few have died as prisoners of war and also as casualties of war. They are noble people that for the most part have been farmers with a sprinkling of other professions:  millers, nurses, doctors, judges, and lawyers.  Regardless of their employment, they have been people who knew heartache and joys. There is nothing that needs be hidden and there is nothing that my family has done that shames me today. 

 

We can learn so much from our family history. I sense their pain and tremble at their hardships. I believe that those things where we feel shame lose all their power over us when they are brought out into the light of day.  I am proud of my family tree and in learning about each member's lives. I pray that the work I do now may afford each of them the opportunity to rejoice as a family together when I pass from this life. When you are ready maybe it would be worthwhile to continue to research your family tree.  Family research may begin by learning about events, dates, and names, but it ends by sending those names to the temple where each member receives the saving ordinances of salvation. 

[cinepro]

Edited October 14, 2013 by cinepro

[CV75]

In a hundred years, when they are on the other side, that may change.  Clearly they did the research to pass on to their kids- presumably.  It will all work out eventually. 

 

Time is the great equalizer- we all go eventually.

Yes, we'll all have the last laugh together!

[Damien the Leper]

Family History is one of the most boring hobbies I ever got over.

[danielwoods]

Is the actual research required - maybe, maybe not.  With all gospel principles we each progress at our own pace.

But here are some teachings I would always consider before giving up on doing family history:

 

"these are principles in relation to the dead and the living that cannot be lightly passed over, as pertaining to our salvation. For their [the dead’s] salvation is necessary and essential to our salvation, as Paul says concerning the fathers—that they without us cannot be made perfect—neither can we without our dead be made perfect. (D&C 128:15)" - Joseph Smith

 

"The living cannot be made perfect without the dead, nor the dead be made perfect without the living. There has got to be a welding together and a joining together of parents and children and children and parents until the whole chain of God's family shall be welded together into one chain, and they shall all become the family of God and His Christ."  - Joseph F. Smith

 

"Will not a man who keeps the commandments of the Lord, who is faithful and true so far as he himself is concerned, receive perfection? Yes, provided his worthy dead also receive the same privileges, because there must be a family organization, a family unit, and each generation must be linked to the chain that goes before in order to bring perfection in family organization. Thus eventually we will be one large family with Adam at the head, Michael, the archangel, presiding over his posterity...." Joseph Fielding Smith Doctrines of Salvation, 2:175-176

 

There are eternal blessings related to our own personal salvation that come from Family History work.  No one can really be saved as an independent entity.

 

Not sure it's worth mentioning that Joseph Smith misquoted and misinterpreted Paul (the writer of the Hebrews quote)

 Hebrews 11:39,40 (KJV):

39 And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:

40 God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.

Hebrews 11:39, 40 (NIV):

39 These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised, 40 since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.

 

 

Smith states, "that they without us cannot be made perfect" which isn't quite what Paul said (notice the word change from "should not" to "cannot").

Of course those who had faith in the past, yet didn't receive the promise will be made perfect (in the final resurrection) regardless of what we do or don't do (context of Hebrews 11). There is nothing in Paul's statement or teaching anywhere that says "that they without us cannot be made perfect".

 

 

 

 

[Stargazer]

Family History is one of the most boring hobbies I ever got over.

 

To each his own.  My father, who was not a member of the Church, was completely fascinated by the subject and spent much time and money investigating our roots.  The month before his death he was on a two week trip back east looking for ancestors.

 

And he was grateful to the Church for providing genealogy libraries.  He spent more time at the Los Angeles Temple than I did!  Outside it, actually.  That's where the Genealogy Library was.

[Calm]

 

 

And he was grateful to the Church for providing genealogy libraries.  He spent more time at the Los Angeles Temple than I did!  Outside it, actually.  That's where the Genealogy Library was.

At our Kansas ward, we had more nonmember librarians than members.  I often had an afternoon shift where there were two nonmembers who were much more experienced and then me.  And most who came into use the facility (it was quite busy) were nonmembers.  Can't say what it was like up in Canada because unlike my son who really enjoyed playing by himself, my daughter insisting on someone---me---being in the same room with her even if she was playing 'by herself'...and we didn't have a laptop then I could carry around.  Between that and not having as much time due to having a house rather than a small apartment and still only one car to share between my husband and me, couldn't get down to the genealogical library that often.

Edited October 15, 2013 by calmoriah

[Stargazer]

As to the research being required, there is a difference between doing the research and doing the ordinance work.  My father was not a member, and he didn't care one bit about the ordinances, but he was all over the research thing.  He wanted to know the maximum amount of information about every ancestor he had.  Isn't it interesting that he told me that he had done no research on my mother's side because he considered it to be MY responsibility?  I mean, why would he even worry about it at all, they weren't his ancestors after all.  But it was clear that subconsciously he considered the research necessary.  For what?  I know he didn't know, but I do.  The Spirit of Elijah.

 

As your family's sole representative in mortality who is capable of getting their work done -- or at least your more recent ancestors' sole representative -- it is somewhat required to see that the work for those ancestors gets done.  If you read Malachi where it talks about the turning of the children to their fathers, that seems somewhat imperative to me, at least.  If you're concerned about living relatives being embarrassed about certain old data, well, just remember that you don't have to discuss those things with them that you have a right to.  You don't need anyone's permission to get the work done for your immediate deceased ancestors (mother, father, their parents, and their parents, because you have an equal right to those ancestors because they are your ancestors, too), and past a certain point in time its fair game for the immediate ancestors AND their children who are not your ancestors.  For example, the children of your grandparents who have living descendants who are not LDS, well you need their permission to have work done for them.  But past that point it depends upon how long ago it was before you don't need any permission.  If you start going down family trees towards where there are living descendants, well you don't a right to those branches, so you would have to ask permission.  Personally, I leave those ancillary branches to the ones who have more of a right than I do -- and if they don't have LDS descendants who will do their work now, well, they will later, so it's all good.

 

The thing about skeletons in the closet is that where they pertain to those still living there is little or no need to be submitting the data.  Where they pertain to the dead, who cares?  The dead don't care -- in fact they might care more that their ordinance work gets done.  When my father told me that he didn't want me to do his work in the temple after he died, I told him "OK!" and then as soon as I could I went through the temple for him.  I don't think he's going to be upset with me about it when I get over there.

 

Perhaps one's great aunt Matilda is highly embarrassed that her first child was born considerably less than 9 months after her wedding.  Well, if she's still living, the information is not actionable for ordinance work anyway.  If she is dead, likely as not her children are still living, and you'd need their permission to get her work done -- if you think that's something you don't want to ask them about, that's not a problem, because your primary concern is your direct ancestors.  You go back much further than your grandparents siblings then chances are nobody at all is going to be concerned about it any longer.  And in all cases you can research lots of information that you don't submit.  Just because you have the data doesn't mean you have to make it public.

 

Another consideration is that the only people who are going to care about this kind of thing are people who are not interested in genealogy in the first place and aren't going to go looking for something they don't care about, especially if they have no reason to suppose that the information has been submitted to the Church in some way.  And as has been pointed out, a lot of the information that some might consider embarrassing in some way is now public domain anyway.

 

One of my grandfathers was somewhat freer in his relationships with women than he should have been, and I have at least one theoretically distant cousin is who actually my uncle, and after my father's death my Mom and Sis accidentally came across a man of approximately my father's age who was a dead ringer for him in the town where my grandparents lived -- evidently one of my grandfather's other by-blows.  And darnit, I wish there was a way to find our who he was because there's an entire branch of my family running completely in stealth mode!  My Dad was an only child, supposedly, but as you can see he had at least 2 half-brothers.  Everyone keeps this secret of course out of some misplaced sense of shame, when the principals to the "crime" are dead and buried and who cares now? 

 

Well, anyway.  As you can perhaps tell I am highly interested in genealogy.

[Stargazer]

Khadija, the other thing to keep in mind is this: likely it is that once you get back a few generations you will find that a lot of the work has been done already, because your ancestors usually had more than one child who each started branches of the family, and some of these branches will have joined the Church after all this time.  I have found this on several lines.  Before the church fixed up its databases there used to be a lot of duplication of effort in the realm of ordinance work, and I have somewhat distant ancestors who have been baptized by proxy multiple times, and so on.  But also some lines where no work had been done at all before I came along.

[The Nehor]

In doing Family History research I have discovered things that are not suitable for others to know, and will go no further with it. Is this research required?

 

Just be grateful you have interesting enough ancestors to have to keep secrets about them.

[Damien the Leper]

To each his own.  My father, who was not a member of the Church, was completely fascinated by the subject and spent much time and money investigating our roots.  The month before his death he was on a two week trip back east looking for ancestors.

 

And he was grateful to the Church for providing genealogy libraries.  He spent more time at the Los Angeles Temple than I did!  Outside it, actually.  That's where the Genealogy Library was.

 

Exactly. I'm not the type of person cut out for the job. I'll leave that to my siblings. I still haven't figured out whether my last name is Greek, German or French. Then again, I don't really care.

 

BTW...just out of curiosity. How would one go about finding out their name given in the temple if they've forgotten it?

[Bill “Papa” Lee]

In doing Family History research I have discovered things that are not suitable for others to know, and will go no further with it. Is this research required?

I don't think so but it is wonderful...I wish I knew everything about my ancestors back to Adam and Eve. Be it my birth family, the "Nation" family or my adopted family, the "Lee" family. Heck, the "Cooper" family, the "Seals" family, The "Preston" family, the "Cox" family. In fact if anyone has a family name I've listed contact me if they lived in the South. While doing my wife's family history, we found out a great Aunt...many greats joined the Church from the South and ended up a plural wife of BY. Both of the names I have had..."Nation" my bio-dad and ""Lee" adopted by my father Albert H Lee; God rest his soul, goes back in this area before there was an Atlanta.

I have such a rich history here in Georgia...the true promised land.

Edit to add: my great, great, great grandfather Mitchell built the oldest standing house in Fulton County in 1813...still there it is called the "Mitchell Tilley House". He came down from Clark County (Athens GA...home of the Bulldogs) and took part in a land lottery. The land where the house sits is some of the most expensive land in the Southeast, and sits a mile and a half from the Atlanta Temple....God's county. Many of the roads around the area are named after family members. His son, Grandpa Mitchell, "Wesley Harris Mitchell" was with "Lee" at Appromaddox (hope I spelled that right) when he surrendered to Grant. He cam home and helped found the First Methodist Church of Sandy Springs, just two miles from the Temple.

Ellen,

I highly recommend knowing all you can about your family...it is soooooooooo great.

Edited October 15, 2013 by Bill “Papa” Lee

[Scott Lloyd]

In doing Family History research I have discovered things that are not suitable for others to know, and will go no further with it. Is this research required?

I think the expectation is that we will participate however we can in the work of enabling the redemption of the dead.

 

This might entail, at different seasons or times in our lives:

 

 - Researching our own ancestral lines with the intent of providing temple ordinances that can be either accepted or rejected by our deceased ancestors.

 

 - Going to the temple and participating in vicarious ordinances for the dead, whether our own ancestors or others.

 

 - Participating in the digital indexing of records that the Church has gathered over the years, so such records can be more easily searched by people tracing their own ancestry.

 

 - Serving family history missions doing such things as digitally scanning (formerly microfilming) records at various places around the world.

 

Is this a requirement? No more so than participating in other aspects of the Church's mission such as missionary work, serving in ward or stake callings, helping the poor and needy as we can, etc.

Edited October 15, 2013 by Scott Lloyd

[EllenMaksoud]

I don't think so but it is wonderful...I wish I knew everything about my ancestors back to Adam and Eve. Be it my birth family, the "Nation" family or my adopted family, the "Lee" family. Heck, the "Cooper" family, the "Seals" family, The "Preston" family, the "Cox" family. In fact if anyone has a family name I've listed contact me if they lived in the South. While doing my wife's family history, we found out a great Aunt...many greats joined the Church from the South and ended up a plural wife of BY. Both of the names I have had..."Nation" my bio-dad and ""Lee" adopted by my father Albert H Lee; God rest his soul, goes back in this area before there was an Atlanta.

I have such a rich history here in Georgia...the true promised land.

Edit to add: my great, great, great grandfather Mitchell built the oldest standing house in Fulton County in 1813...still there it is called the "Mitchell Tilley House". He came down from Clark County (Athens GA...home of the Bulldogs) and took part in a land lottery. The land where the house sits is some of the most expensive land in the Southeast, and sits a mile and a half from the Atlanta Temple....God's county. Many of the roads around the area are named after family members. His son, Grandpa Mitchell, "Wesley Harris Mitchell" was with "Lee" at Appromaddox (hope I spelled that right) when he surrendered to Grant. He cam home and helped found the First Methodist Church of Sandy Springs, just two miles from the Temple.

Ellen,

I highly recommend knowing all you can about your family...it is soooooooooo great.

I had no idea how bad it was. What I found out when I went into the records tonight. I don't have a future and will be leaving the church.  Someone, and I know who, has put into the record things that I was told not to talk of or record.  This invalidates the Atonement for me. I never discussed any of these things with anyone but the bishop.  I had a nice 2 1/2 years though, the best time in my life.

[Tacenda]

I had no idea how bad it was. What I found out when I went into the records tonight. I don't have a future and will be leaving the church. Someone, and I know who, has put into the record things that I was told not to talk of or record. This invalidates the Atonement for me. I never discussed any of these things with anyone but the bishop. I had a nice 2 1/2 years though, the best time in my life.

These are humans, don't let them take away how happy you've been in the church, I wish I had a testimony like you have, and and so many on here have!

[JLHPROF]

I had no idea how bad it was. What I found out when I went into the records tonight. I don't have a future and will be leaving the church.  Someone, and I know who, has put into the record things that I was told not to talk of or record.  This invalidates the Atonement for me. I never discussed any of these things with anyone but the bishop.  I had a nice 2 1/2 years though, the best time in my life.

 

I'm not sure what you could possibly have found, but nothing can invalidate the atonement, I promise.  No matter what, you have a future with our Lord and Saviour.  The only requirement is that you choose to follow him.  Even if the Church or circumstances have turned out different than you wanted or expected.  Don't give up on what is true.