Temple wedding policies

[HappyJackWagon]

3 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I'm not sure how else to understand him.  If your bishop knew you were getting married and was talking to you about the event--and if you knew he really wanted you to get married in the temple--if he said "temple sealings are for your ancestors, not you" what would you understand him to be saying?

The only way i can think of to understand is that the bishop believes that temple sealing and temple marriage are not the same thing.  One if for the dead/ignorant and the other is for the living.

I think that is very problematic language because it's not really accurate. I understand what he may be trying to say, but temple sealings are every bit as much for us as for our ancestors. The sealing is what matters unless the sealing is conflated with the legal marriage, which seems to be happening here.

We don't perform marriages for the dead. They must have already been married to receive the sealing. Whereas the living can choose and act for themselves in marriage (and he conflates that marriage with eternal sealing).

[thesometimesaint]

Ministers of any religion have the legal power to perform the marriage ceremony in the US. It has no effect on the Sealing which is done by our Church.

[bsjkki]

42 minutes ago, bluebell said:

This is what he says about it-

Remember, the temples of God are not for the vicarious temple ordinances for those who have known the gospel. I’m sure we misunderstand that. Those who live as you have lived for twenty years—as some of you will live for forty years and eighty years—this vicarious temple work isn’t for you. You do your work yourselves. That’s your job, to go up to the temple and get your endowments when you’re properly matured—your job, not your parents’ job or the responsibility of people after them, to give you blessings or even to open the door to blessings for you if you are not interested enough to get them for yourself. It’s for your grandfather and your great-great-grandparents and my great-great-grandparents. Those are the ones we go to the temple for. Those are the ones we do the work for, those who were born when there was no gospel on the earth, when there was no temple or idea of a temple.  

God is the God of the living, not the God of the dead. And people who close their eyes and their ears and fail to follow the commandments of God are dead. They’re dead as to all the things that are worthy: dead as to the benefits, dead as to the blessings, dead as to this natural and eternal gift.

Temple sealings are for your ancestors, the people who could have traveled all over the world and never found a temple or a temple president or helpers to take them through and give them their endowments—people who were good, good as you and I are good, or better, and who may have neared perfection in their lives. But there were no temples; there were no temple workers. They had to wait. We must do their work for them. That’s why we have our genealogical work. That’s why we have the temple.

We go forward and we have the work done for those who die. But we have no guarantee that anyone will ever receive the gospel when we do it for him after his death. We hope he will; we go forward and we hope that he will accept the gospel. But we have no assurance whatever that he will ever accept it. For people are very much the same when they arise from the resurrection as they are on the day they were buried. It’s for them to accept it; and it’s for you to accept it, today, while you live, while you can, while you have your own free agency.

Our Lord is not the God of the dead. Those who marry civilly by secular means to avoid the restrictions in dress by reason of the garments, or by reason of restrictions as to divorce, fun, freedoms, so-called, are postponing to their own peril. Are not they the dead? Remember, our temple work is for those who have passed on without opportunity, not for those who have had opportunity and rejected it. There’s a tremendous difference between him who misses the blessing and him who rejects the blessing. Men of our day calculate and evaluate and develop opinions and “kick against the pricks” and close the door to their own opportunities. You won’t do that, will you? These people are like the Pharisees, the Sadducees. They are like the Pharisees and the hypocrites and the scribes who “shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in” (Matthew 23: 13).

And-

I remember an article in a local newspaper, telling of a young couple married in Salt Lake by a man who had only civil authority—no power beyond the grave. They had a brilliant wedding breakfast. They got into the car to travel to another city for an evening wedding reception, where hundreds of friends and relatives would come to wish them well. They did not reach their destination. There was no reception. A car accident took their lives. Their mortality was ended. An eternal life had not been provided for. About three hours of marriage, and the end of it came like a flash of lightning. And the sad thing was that their three-hour marriage was performed within a mile of the holy Temple, where a man with the sealing power would gladly have saved them from the bitter cup.

They’re in eternity now. I don’t know what they’re thinking or what they’re doing, but they’re not prepared for eternity. They had grown to twenty years or more of life and they didn’t go to the temple, even though they were members of the Church. They ignored it. They left it. If they ever gave a serious thought, do you suppose they were saying, “Oh, we can have the sealing ordinance performed later”? Do you suppose the bereaved family was thinking, “Well, it’s too bad; but then, we can go to the temple in a year and have the work done for them”?

Yes, the family can go to the temple a year later. Yes, they can do the ordinance work for them. And the records will show it. But the question is, Will the young deceased couple accept the ordinances when they were of such little consequence to them while they lived? And more important than all else, do you think that God is going to be mocked? He is the God of the living, not of the dead. And they were dead, both physically and also, it would seem, spiritually. He has identified this ordinance as one to be done in mortality while you have your body and your spirit together. Perhaps not any scripture emanating from the mouth of God has been so definite and positive and unchangeable as those we are quoting. It has been said that we rise from the grave much as we lie down in it. We change little in our attitudes and moods and desires in that period when our spirit is freed from our body that is in the grave. The process of change in the body does not necessarily change the inner man. If the gospel truths mean little to us as we die, they are not likely to mean very much to us when we rise.

 

I think it's really interesting that he said that temple sealing are for our ancestors and not for us.  To me, that means that he sees no confusion between marriage and sealing.  Temple marriage is for the living and temple sealing are for the dead or those who otherwise did not have the ability to choose to get one when the marriage took place.  

We assume that the church really means temple sealing when it says temple marriage, but I think this talk is evidence that we are wrong in that assumption.  The church sees a difference between a temple marriage and a temple sealing, and its a difference that stems from our use of agency.  

If that's true, then the policy makes a lot more sense.

The couple in this story could have been unworthy or not ready to make temple covenants. The joy I have in the gospel is that their work will be done and they have opportunities beyond the grave to accept the work.  The gospel gives this couple and their families hope.

Mormon culture emphasizes temple marriage, as it should, but just like pressure to serve missions, sometimes the social pressure outweighs spiritual maturity.

I have two relatives who left the church soon after their temple weddings. I know another that have struggled, repented and been through 'heck' to get there 3 years after their civil marriage. 

Sometimes policies have unexpected side effects that cause cultural elements to overshadow the spiritually desired goals.

[ttribe]

2 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

At least as much as your cohort ttribe has

I have cohorts?  Who knew?

[Scott Lloyd]

27 minutes ago, HappyJackWagon said:

I think that is very problematic language because it's not really accurate. I understand what he may be trying to say, but temple sealings are every bit as much for us as for our ancestors. The sealing is what matters unless the sealing is conflated with the legal marriage, which seems to be happening here.

We don't perform marriages for the dead. They must have already been married to receive the sealing. Whereas the living can choose and act for themselves in marriage (and he conflates that marriage with eternal sealing).

Where possible, the sealing is to be incorporated within the marriage ceremony of the (living) couple, not to be put off until later for the sake of convenience.

Edited May 25, 2017 by Scott Lloyd

[Scott Lloyd]

4 minutes ago, ttribe said:

I have cohorts?  Who knew?

From Merriam-Webster online (definition 2): companion, colleague

[ttribe]

1 minute ago, Scott Lloyd said:

From Merriam-Webster online (definition 2): companion, colleague

Yes, Scott, I know the definition.

Do you have any idea how arrogant that makes you look to do such a thing?

[Scott Lloyd]

3 minutes ago, ttribe said:

Yes, Scott, I know the definition.

Do you have any idea how arrogant that makes you look to do such a thing?

It was apparent you didn't understand what I meant, so I provided a normative dictionary definition to document my intended meaning.

If you think that makes me arrogant, well, I scarcely know what to say about that.

[bluebell]

1 hour ago, HappyJackWagon said:

This really doesn't make any sense to me. Temple marriage is only eternal because of the sealing. Can you explain the benefits and blessings of a Temple marriage that doesn't include the sealing?

I think of the marriage and sealing are more like baptism and confirmation; 2 separate pieces of the same ordinance but the first only has lasting impact if it is followed by the 2nd. I don't see any value in a temple marriage without a sealing that is better than a non-temple marriage without sealing.

I think Pres. Kimball is conflating the two things because they are so closely tied together. But marriage and sealing are clearly different things.

The obvious difference between the temple marriage and the temple sealing is that in a temple marriage, the sealer is binding the person civilly as well as eternally.  Temple marriages are all sealings, but not all sealings are temple marriages.

Pres. Kimball seems to see a difference that is much the same as the difference between baptism and baptism for the dead.  It's the same ordinance but it's not for the same people.  

It's an intriguing statement and it would be interesting to know if he ever spoke about it again.  

 

[Scott Lloyd]

1 hour ago, HappyJackWagon said:

So according to the current policy, Pres. Kimball could not have been married civilly and then sealed 7 months later. Again, there is no evidence I've seen that this policy is doctrinal. It's a policy aimed at testing loyalty and obedience (as Scott attested to earlier).

(emphasis mine for reference)

If you are going to quote me, please do it accurately and contextually. What I said was that it shows obedience to God. You had intimated that the loyalty and obedience was to Church leaders (intentionally or not, you had left God out of the picture).

And I'm unclear why you think that a purpose of showing obedience and loyalty to God would make a thing undoctrinal.

 

Edited May 25, 2017 by Scott Lloyd

[bluebell]

28 minutes ago, bsjkki said:

The couple in this story could have been unworthy or not ready to make temple covenants. The joy I have in the gospel is that their work will be done and they have opportunities beyond the grave to accept the work.  The gospel gives this couple and their families hope.

Mormon culture emphasizes temple marriage, as it should, but just like pressure to serve missions, sometimes the social pressure outweighs spiritual maturity.

I have two relatives who left the church soon after their temple weddings. I know another that have struggled, repented and been through 'heck' to get there 3 years after their civil marriage. 

 

I agree.  I don't think Pres. Kimball was saying there was no hope, only that hope is not the same thing as assurance.  We do tend to function as if doing the work for someone in the temple is an assurance that they will receive those blessings. 

I think he was coming at the topic from a mercy cannot rob justice point of view.  It's doctrinally correct, but there are other doctrinally correct points of view as well.  

[bluebell]

1 hour ago, HappyJackWagon said:

So according to the current policy, Pres. Kimball could not have been married civilly and then sealed 7 months later. Again, there is no evidence I've seen that this policy is doctrinal. It's a policy aimed at testing loyalty and obedience (as Scott attested to earlier).

The policy allows for 1st presidency exceptions so I don't think we can say that according to the current policy Kimball could not have been sealed 7 months later.  If the 1st presidency gives exceptions it seems reasonable to assume that they are probably likely to give them for couples who wanted a temple marriage but through no fault of their own could not get one.

[stemelbow]

1 minute ago, bluebell said:

The policy allows for 1st presidency exceptions so I don't think we can say that according to the current policy Kimball could not have been sealed 7 months later.  If the 1st presidency gives exceptions it seems reasonable to assume that they are probably likely to give them for couples who wanted a temple marriage but through no fault of their own could not get one.

It would be odd, though, to take his story and say he and his wife "deliberately refuse[d] temple marriage for reasons of their own, and afterward desire a sealing,"

That may also provide us commentary on the quote from the 60s that was offered earlier.  No one should be said to deliberately refuses temple marriage if they want to get married with family or it is difficult for them to travel to a temple for a sealing. 

[ttribe]

21 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

It was apparent you didn't understand what I meant, so I provided a normative dictionary definition to document my intended meaning.

If you think that makes me arrogant, well, I scarcely know what to say about that.

So, the answer to my (rhetorical) question is "No", you don't know.

I understood what you meant, just fine.  I was making light of it.

Edited May 25, 2017 by ttribe

[Scott Lloyd]

9 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

It would be odd, though, to take his story and say he and his wife "deliberately refuse[d] temple marriage for reasons of their own, and afterward desire a sealing,"

That may also provide us commentary on the quote from the 60s that was offered earlier.  No one should be said to deliberately refuses temple marriage if they want to get married with family or it is difficult for them to travel to a temple for a sealing. 

Being married civilly because one's poverty precludes an immediate and costly journey for a temple marriage is a different matter than being married civilly because one doesn't want to offend Grandma or Uncle Joe.

Edited May 25, 2017 by Scott Lloyd

[Scott Lloyd]

2 minutes ago, ttribe said:

So, the answer to my (rhetorical) question is "No", you don't know.

I'll admit that with each of your posts I'm finding it increasingly difficult to ascertain how your thought processes work.

[stemelbow]

1 minute ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Being married civilly because one's poverty precludes an immediate temple marriage is a different matter than being married civilly because one doesn't want to offend Grandma or Uncle Joe.

Sure, in a sense.  But, I will add, he was able to get sealed 7mos later in Salt Lake.  So, all it took was some realigning of priorities, perhaps time, to make the trip happen.  It seems they prioritized getting married over their temple ordinance.  Then again, such a condemning view is silly.  They didn't prioritize it at all, just like couples wouldn't prioritize their family over God if they get married with family before being sealed. 

[HappyJackWagon]

27 minutes ago, bluebell said:

The obvious difference between the temple marriage and the temple sealing is that in a temple marriage, the sealer is binding the person civilly as well as eternally.  Temple marriages are all sealings, but not all sealings are temple marriages.

Pres. Kimball seems to see a difference that is much the same as the difference between baptism and baptism for the dead.  It's the same ordinance but it's not for the same people.  

It's an intriguing statement and it would be interesting to know if he ever spoke about it again.  

 

No. That's not correct. As I've said previously, not all temple marriages are sealings. A couple can be married for time in the temple. It is not an eternal sealing.

[HappyJackWagon]

25 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Being married civilly because one's poverty precludes an immediate and costly journey for a temple marriage is a different matter than being married civilly because one doesn't want to offend Grandma or Uncle Joe.

Says you.

Why is one reason morally acceptable and the other is not? Do the feelings of family members not matter? Is poverty the only acceptable reason to not get married in the temple, or are there others? What are they? How extreme was the poverty that prevented him from traveling all the way from Arizona to St. George? Do we know? Does it really matter? I don't think it does.

I trust that he made the best decision he could in his circumstance and it would be unfortunate for someone to say something like he "deliberately refuse[d] temple marriage for reasons of [his] own, and afterward desire[d] a sealing."

ETA- the distance from Pima to St. George is @ 570 miles which is not an insignificant distance in 1917. But I wonder what the cutoff would be. If the distance was only 400 miles, would he have been expected to be married and sealed in the temple? 200 miles? Policies like this get very pharisaical when these kinds of specifics must be addressed. It is so much easier to leave it up to the individual to decide for themselves if 570 miles is too far, or if hurting family feelings was a good enough reason to marry civilly before going to the temple. The church creates the problem by trying to enforce the opinions of leaders on the rest of the members instead of letting them decide for themselves.

 

Edited May 25, 2017 by HappyJackWagon

[Scott Lloyd]

12 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

Sure, in a sense.  But, I will add, he was able to get sealed 7mos later in Salt Lake.  So, all it took was some realigning of priorities, perhaps time, to make the trip happen.  It seems they prioritized getting married over their temple ordinance.  Then again, such a condemning view is silly.  They didn't prioritize it at all, just like couples wouldn't prioritize their family over God if they get married with family before being sealed. 

The family finances might have been so tight that they could not predict how soon, if ever, they would be able to afford the trip. Or there may have been other circumstances that would render it unwise or impractical to put off the marriage. It just strikes me as a something more extenuating than a desire to pacify extended-family members.

[stemelbow]

1 minute ago, Scott Lloyd said:

The family finances might have been so tight that they could not predict how soon, if ever, they would be able to afford the trip. Or there may have been other circumstances that would render it unwise or impractical to put off the marriage. It just strikes me as a something more extenuating than a desire to pacify extended-family members.

It strikes me as more extenuating than a desire to pacify extended-family members for couples to want their families involved in their marriages.  So whatever. 

[Scott Lloyd]

14 minutes ago, HappyJackWagon said:

No. That's not correct. As I've said previously, not all temple marriages are sealings. A couple can be married for time in the temple. It is not an eternal sealing.

I understand what she meant; I trust that you are smart enough to as well.

 

Edited May 25, 2017 by Scott Lloyd

[rockpond]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

I'm not sure how else to understand him.  If your bishop knew you were getting married and was talking to you about the event--and if you knew he really wanted you to get married in the temple--if he said "temple sealings are for your ancestors, not you" what would you understand him to be saying?

The only way i can think of to understand is that the bishop believes that temple sealing and temple marriage are not the same thing.  One if for the dead/ignorant and the other is for the living.

I wouldn't understand him as being literal in saying that.  Obviously the sealing ordinance has promises that are for the couple and it is a covenant that the couple is entering into.  We can't say that the sealing is not for the couple as well.  If he said that to me, I'd have some questions for him.

Apart from the sealing, I am not understanding what "temple marriage" is.  As far as I can tell, it is only a state recognition that the sealing has satisfied the requirements of the state in terms of the couple being legally married.

 

[ttribe]

4 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

The family finances might have been so tight that they could not predict how soon, if ever, they would be able to afford the trip. Or there may have been other circumstances that would render it unwise or impractical to put off the marriage. It just strikes me as a something more extenuating than a desire to pacify extended-family members.

Question - When you were married (presumably, in the Temple), was there a single close family member who couldn't attend because he or she either didn't hold a recommend or was not a member?

[bluebell]

15 minutes ago, HappyJackWagon said:

No. That's not correct. As I've said previously, not all temple marriages are sealings. A couple can be married for time in the temple. It is not an eternal sealing.

I thought they stopped doing that.

But they definitely used to (and maybe they still do) so it would be more correct to say that there are two kinds of temple marriages, one of which is also a sealing and one that isn't.