Bernard Gui Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 (edited) What will happen when missionaries encounter a ssm couple who wants to join the church?Is this an opportunity for less-than honest-people to create mischief? Edited July 20, 2015 by Bernard Gui
halconero Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 (edited) They won't make it past the interview process. If they go to the news about it I suspect from personal experience that 99% of gay people will shake their heads and ask "what did you think was going to happen?" Yay, another fear-mongering thread about gay stuff, because we don't have enough of those already. Excuse me while I move threads to a more interesting topic about women and conference, or exaltation or something. Edited July 20, 2015 by halconero 2
ksfisher Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 The baptism interview is always an opportunity for less-than-honest people to create mischief.
toon Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 What currently happens? It's not like SSM couples are an entirely new phenomon.
cinepro Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 It's a good question, but not a difficult one. Obviously they need to be living the law of chastity, and since the Church does not believe homosexual relations in a legal marraige are "chaste", they would need to stop engaging in homosexual relations. I have known active, Temple-recommend holding gay LDS who lived together solely as roommates, so it can be done. But neither are still in the Church anymore, so I can't speak to the long-term prospects of such an arrangement. This question is linked to the broader and very important question discussed in this blog post: What does the Church Want Non-LDS Gay People to Do? Given that it’s unreasonable to expect non-LDS gay people to follow church standards on this, how is gay marriage not the best of the remaining options? It might still be seen as sinful and detrimental to society, but it’s surely the lesser of several evils. It’s more likely to encourage stable relationships—and I think there is widespread agreement that those are preferable for children, and I think arguably better for society as a whole. It also has the advantage of giving all people equal treatment, which I think in general the church doesn’t necessarily see as a bad thing, especially given our own history of being persecuted for socially unacceptable marriage practices. Another important question is what the church would expect from the many already-existing families in which the spouses are gay. Should they divorce, in the interests of what is best for society? Especially if they have children, this seems a problematic option. I think one of the problems here is the church currently makes no moral distinction between promiscuous, extra-marital gay sex, and gay sex in the context of a committed relationship. It’s all indiscriminately bad. But I think this position needs to be seriously questioned, if the church is going to make the case that it wants not only what is good for its members, but what is good for society more generally. 1
Daniel2 Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 What will happen when missionaries encounter a ssm couple who wants to join the church?Is this an opportunity for less-than honest-people to create mischief? The same thing that has always happened when missionaries encounter non-members who want to get baptized but are living by standards that conflict with the church's standards--they will have to alter their behavior or marital status to bring them into alignment with the church's in order to get baptized. For straight, non-married couples living together, that means they have to get married first. For straight, non-married couples that are married to prior spouses, they will have to first divorce their former spouse and then marry their current spouse (In my mission in Argentina, couples like this were called "juntado," or "togethered." It was a fairly common thing because it was expensive and challenging to get divorced, so many people who had separated from their first husband or wife would simply move in with their new spouse and establish a home, family, and even kids. One couple we taught on my mission had been "juntado" for 20+ years and had three teenage kids together, and we had to go through a 9 month long process to track down the dad's first wife so he could divorce her, then marry his new wife who he'd been living with for 20 years, and finally then got baptized. We didn't know they weren't actually married until the baptismal interview...). For straight, polygamously-married individuals, they'd have to divorce all but one of their spouses in order to get baptized. And for gay married couples, they'd clearly have to get divorced to get baptized. I don't see how this marks any type of situation where "less-than-honest people" could "cause mischief" any more or less than has already been happening...
Mormonmaniac Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 Repentance always precedes baptism. It they repent and change they can be baptized. 2
smac97 Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 What will happen when missionaries encounter a ssm couple who wants to join the church?Is this an opportunity for less-than honest-people to create mischief? I imagine they will encounter the same issue that people who are living together but unmarried, or who are living in polygamous relationships. Thanks, -Smac
Bernard Gui Posted July 20, 2015 Author Posted July 20, 2015 (edited) Thanks for the replies. Some of you apparently misunderstood the 2nd question...Let me rephrase....There are currently cases in which Christian businesses were deliberately targeted by gay activists to provoke a reaction that could be litigated. It is not unreasonable or "fear mongering" to wonder if that may happen to missionaries who are set up by such an activist ssm couple who then go to the press with the accusation that in order to join the Church, they must either divorce or stop expressing their physical love for each other. Given the astonishingly rapid climate change in public opinion and our legal sysrem, could this not be another problem that will further demonize and marginalize the Church? Edited July 20, 2015 by Bernard Gui
Avatar4321 Posted July 20, 2015 Posted July 20, 2015 Repentance always precedes baptism. It they repent and change they can be baptized.Sums it up nicely. Nothing new here.
Bernard Gui Posted July 20, 2015 Author Posted July 20, 2015 I imagine they will encounter the same issue that people who are living together but unmarried, or who are living in polygamous relationships. Thanks, -SmacThe remedy for people living together is simply to get married. Polygamous marriages are not legal.....yet.The remedy for a legally married ssm couple is divorce?
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