Polygamy makes me doubt God’s love

[ekilgroe]

I was born and raised in the church. I used to always feel close to our Heavenly Father and feel strongly that He loved me and considered him my constant companion, the Being who loved me more than I could comprehend, my everything. That all changed when I was a teenager and learned more about polygamy.

At that age I looked forward to someday loving a man and being loved deeply by him in return, and the idea that given certain circumstances, God would have me share that man with another woman or women in this life and forever more in Heaven hurt and scared me. Surely a man couldn’t love all his wives equally, and even if he could…not being his only one would be excruciating.

It seemed so unlike the Father whose love I’d felt and cherished, yet it was true: He had commanded people to practice polygamy in the early days of the restored church. I frantically researched plural marriage in those days and it all only made me feel worse: I read about an angel with a flaming sword commanding Joseph Smith to practice plural marriage even though he was reluctant to hurt his wife like that, God commanding Emma Smith to stay with Joseph or He would give him ‘an hundred wives’. Such disregard for the pain of those involved, plus subjecting 100 random people to a life and eternity of loveless marriage just to punish one person for hesitating to submit to the worst pain of their life…went against everything I thought I knew about God.

Yeah I know that God intended to build up the church and so commanded polygamy to increase the church population, and that this was such an important thing that had to be done and that’s why he responded so harshly to Joseph and Emma’s resistance. But all things are supposed to be possible with God, so surely He could have come up with another way if His daughters’ eternal happiness and romance really mattered to Him. Or He could have tried reasoning with and reassuring them through their fears first at least, and then threatened them last of all else failed.

The ‘fact’(?) that there will be far more righteous women in Heaven than there will be men, and they all need to be sealed to be exalted and so we have no other options but to share husbands in the Celestial Kingdom doesn’t make me feel any better either, so please don’t tell me that.

I feel betrayed by God. How could a loving father do this to his children? I’ve since found it difficult to feel His love, and I think it’s because I’m afraid to open my heart to Him. I don’t want to feel His love and closeness with him, only to remember polygamy and feel betrayed like being doused in cold water all over again.

In my mind, I just can’t reconcile the love I used to feel from God with his command of eternally sharing a spouse—polygamy and allowing a man to be sealed to more than one woman if his former wife dies—is the antithesis of love. Being commanded into it for the purpose of building up the church population/making bodies for our spiritual siblings feels objectifying—no matter how important it may be.
Some might try to tell me: “Children were meant to have that close bond of sharing a body with their mother. A mother’s love is closest to God’s love.” But what’s the use of the child’s need to feel loved is going to expire the day God needs her powers of reproduction? What if her other relationships then? 

Is obtaining a physical body all that matters in this life? Is love between spouses actually irrelevant? Is romantic love just a ruse to get people close enough to make bodies? Why does God command men to love their wives in other scriptures and then command some of them to take on more than they could possibly get to know well and love on top of everything else he has to do in this life? And if the women subjected to plural marriage don’t need a husband’s love after all, then why would anyone else?

It makes me hurt and confused and angry to try and imagine a God cold-hearted enough to not care about his children’s eternal personal relationships with their spouse, and to threaten them when they hesitate, as being kind and patient. I want the latter, but it clashes with the former.

I don’t know what I should expect of Jesus’s nature anymore. 

I’ve prayed and continued to do research over the years and all I can seem to find is stuff like men quickly assuring readers that the men who practiced polygamy were acting under God’s command and that they all made it to Heaven; a story of a teenager who had to let go of her crush on a boy her age to marry a middle aged man; and accusations of not even being pure enough for the kingdom of Heaven if I wouldn’t allow a fellow woman to be sealed to my husband in order to make it into the Celestial Kingdom; claims that: “I know the concept of polygamy is uncomfortable, but have faith in God anyway.”; and other weak crap that doesn’t answer any of my questions. I have never found anything to suggest that the women who participated in polygamy were assured romantic love—if only in the next life—nor any words of reassurance to them from God. 

The God I used to feel close to and the God who commanded his servants to submit to polygamy or be damned, who didn’t care how many people He subjected to the painful practice, nor how young they were, seem like two completely different people to me and like I said, I don’t know how to feel about Him now.

I follow church teachings now only because it’s that or damnation. God is nothing more to me than my God now. I no longer see Him as my father. I don’t want to get married. I see it as nothing more or less than a license to bear children/a ticket into the Celestial Kingdom now.

Does anyone have any advice? Is there actually any hope? 

 

[bluebell]

I don't struggle with polygamy very much but I too have struggled to feel like God cares about His daughters when I read the scriptures, especially the OT where women only seemed to exist to bless men, and were equally disposable when they weren't needed for that.  I don't know what the answers are, other than my own ability to cling to what I know (I know that God loves me) and not let what I don't know (the accuracy of the scriptures and what was actually going on) ruin it.  

Sometimes when I am feeling God's love these other problems come into my mind and I have learned to recognize that the spirit that brought those things to my remembrance desires my despair and uses them to accomplish that goal.  I have taken to verbally saying "leave me alone" at such times and the doubting thoughts disappear.  I still continue to struggle from time to time though, being human and all.

I heard someone once say "don't leave the church over something that you have learned, when the people who actually had to live it maintained their testimonies and endured."  That might not impact anyone else, but it really hit me.  Leaving the church over historical information didn't make sense to me.  For me the fruit of something is found in the results from an action, not in information. 

I think that's might be one reason that these women and men who were called to actually live polygamy had a testimony of it--the action allowed them to personally experience the fruit.  It also provided a great way for the spirit to testify to them whether or not it was true.  And finally, they were deeply invested in seeking the Lord's will for them personally on a required action, which in my experience makes it easier for the spirit to reach us, and makes us more open to it's guidance.

When it comes to trying to get a feel for whether or not something we are learning about in church history is true, I think it's much harder because we are not really being asked to take any action in gaining that knowledge.  If we really do receive answers after our faith has been tried, trying to get answers to questions of information, rather courses of action, is a more difficult road (in my experience).

I know that you've said that you've read men's thoughts on the practice.  Have you been able to read any of the words from the women who lived polygamy and found it was a blessing in their lives?  Sometimes letting the women speak for themselves is the best option, rather than trying to filter their experiences through our opinions on a subject.  It doesn't mean you will automatically agree with their perspective, but at least you will have some evidence of how other women continued to feel God's love even as they lived in plural marriage.

[Robert F. Smith]

2 hours ago, ekilgroe said:

.................... I used to always feel close to our Heavenly Father and feel strongly that He loved me and considered him my constant companion, the Being who loved me more than I could comprehend, my everything. That all changed when I was a teenager and learned more about polygamy.

At that age I looked forward to someday loving a man and being loved deeply by him in return, and the idea that given certain circumstances, God would have me share that man with another woman or women in this life and forever more in Heaven hurt and scared me. Surely a man couldn’t love all his wives equally, and even if he could…not being his only one would be excruciating.

It seemed so unlike the Father whose love I’d felt and cherished, yet it was true: He had commanded people to practice polygamy in the early days of the restored church. I frantically researched plural marriage in those days and it all only made me feel worse: I read about an angel with a flaming sword commanding Joseph Smith to practice plural marriage even though he was reluctant to hurt his wife like that, God commanding Emma Smith to stay with Joseph or He would give him ‘an hundred wives’. Such disregard for the pain of those involved, plus subjecting 100 random people to a life and eternity of loveless marriage just to punish one person for hesitating to submit to the worst pain of their life…went against everything I thought I knew about God.

Yeah I know that God intended to build up the church and so commanded polygamy to increase the church population, and that this was such an important thing that had to be done and that’s why he responded so harshly to Joseph and Emma’s resistance. ........................

The early LDS experience with sealing of men to men and men to women probably had nothing to do with building up the Church population.  And many LDS members did not practice polygamy.  For some men, even marrying just one woman would be one too many. 

2 hours ago, ekilgroe said:

The ‘fact’(?) that there will be far more righteous women in Heaven than there will be men, and they all need to be sealed to be exalted and so we have no other options but to share husbands in the Celestial Kingdom doesn’t make me feel any better either, so please don’t tell me that.

You are right to place a question mark there:  There is no reason to believe that there will be more females in the celestial kingdom than males.  Likewise the notion that being exalted means being forced into loveless polygamous, marriages seems rather odd.  I would expect such dissatisfaction from the gods of Olympus who really are mere extensions of flawed humans.

2 hours ago, ekilgroe said:

I feel betrayed by God. How could a loving father do this to his children? I’ve since found it difficult to feel His love, and I think it’s because I’m afraid to open my heart to Him. I don’t want to feel His love and closeness with him, only to remember polygamy and feel betrayed like being doused in cold water all over again.

In my mind, I just can’t reconcile the love I used to feel from God with his command of eternally sharing a spouse—polygamy and allowing a man to be sealed to more than one woman if his former wife dies—is the antithesis of love. Being commanded into it for the purpose of building up the church population/making bodies for our spiritual siblings feels objectifying—no matter how important it may be.
Some might try to tell me: “Children were meant to have that close bond of sharing a body with their mother. A mother’s love is closest to God’s love.” But what’s the use of the child’s need to feel loved is going to expire the day God needs her powers of reproduction? What if her other relationships then? 

Is obtaining a physical body all that matters in this life? Is love between spouses actually irrelevant? Is romantic love just a ruse to get people close enough to make bodies? Why does God command men to love their wives in other scriptures and then command some of them to take on more than they could possibly get to know well and love on top of everything else he has to do in this life? And if the women subjected to plural marriage don’t need a husband’s love after all, then why would anyone else?

It makes me hurt and confused and angry to try and imagine a God cold-hearted enough to not care about his children’s eternal personal relationships with their spouse, and to threaten them when they hesitate, as being kind and patient. I want the latter, but it clashes with the former.

I don’t know what I should expect of Jesus’s nature anymore. 

The patriarchs Abraham and Jacob each had multiple wives, and that was a cause of some trouble for Abe, but God never had any problem with it, and He even gave multiple wives to King David under prophetic order.  Why?  We don't know, but those were cultural norms then, and during most of human history -- and remains true among the great apes.  Thus, some scholars suggest that the Old Testament should be separated from the New Testament, where (presumably) polygamy was not allowed.  Those scholars were not concerned with polygamy, but rather with the type of god in the OT versus the type in the NT.  There is a YouTube video on that.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yji0fqtVEw8&t=9s

 

2 hours ago, ekilgroe said:

I’ve prayed and continued to do research over the years and all I can seem to find is stuff like men quickly assuring readers that the men who practiced polygamy were acting under God’s command and that they all made it to Heaven; a story of a teenager who had to let go of her crush on a boy her age to marry a middle aged man; and accusations of not even being pure enough for the kingdom of Heaven if I wouldn’t allow a fellow woman to be sealed to my husband in order to make it into the Celestial Kingdom; claims that: “I know the concept of polygamy is uncomfortable, but have faith in God anyway.”; and other weak crap that doesn’t answer any of my questions. I have never found anything to suggest that the women who participated in polygamy were assured romantic love—if only in the next life—nor any words of reassurance to them from God. 

The God I used to feel close to and the God who commanded his servants to submit to polygamy or be damned, who didn’t care how many people He subjected to the painful practice, nor how young they were, seem like two completely different people to me and like I said, I don’t know how to feel about Him now.

I follow church teachings now only because it’s that or damnation. God is nothing more to me than my God now. I no longer see Him as my father. I don’t want to get married. I see it as nothing more or less than a license to bear children/a ticket into the Celestial Kingdom now.

Does anyone have any advice? Is there actually any hope?

Famed Mormon poet Carol Lynn Pearson expressed a similar distaste or disgust for polygamy, but I don't think that either of you will be damned for that opinion.  You should feel free to express your opinion on such matters.  And be true to yourself.

Edited November 11, 2021 by Robert F. Smith

[strappinglad]

I am currently re-reading the Hales book on polygamy. There is the concept of " presentism " whereby people judge the past using the present's criteria. I think that there is also a tendency toward " mortalism " in which people judge the spirit life using mortality's criteria. 

One question I think about  . If the US government and society at large had not been so violently opposed to polygamy, would the Church still be practicing it today? 

Edited November 11, 2021 by strappinglad

[Olmec Donald]

 

6 hours ago, ekilgroe said:

Polygamy makes me doubt God's love.

And God's love makes me doubt polygamy, at least as it's taught in the LDS Church (past and present). 

Remember that the first thing they did after you were baptized was give you the Gift of the Holy Ghost.  That means there is a direct line of communication between your soul and God the Holy Spirit.  And it just so happens that God the Holy Spirit out-ranks Joseph Smith and ALL of the church leaders, living or dead, COMBINED. 

I understand that it is difficult to trust something as solitary as what you feel in your heart and in your mind over the religion you (presumably) have very good reasons to believe in.  May I suggest that Joseph Smith, the LDS Church, and its history are neither all good nor all bad.  I suggest giving more credibility to what God tells YOU than to any religion.

Rather than editing your concept of God until He is something you hate just to be in alignment with what the Church teaches, edit what the Church teaches until you have something that aligns with a God who loves you.  Be a direct-line-of-communication follower of God first, and a follower of religion second.

If you would like my thoughts about polygamy let me know, but my main point is that it's okay (and probably even part of your lesson plan) for you to trust the still, small voice within over ALL external voices. 

Edited November 11, 2021 by Olmec Donald

[teddyaware]

4 hours ago, ekilgroe said:

I was born and raised in the church. I used to always feel close to our Heavenly Father and feel strongly that He loved me and considered him my constant companion, the Being who loved me more than I could comprehend, my everything. That all changed when I was a teenager and learned more about polygamy.

At that age I looked forward to someday loving a man and being loved deeply by him in return, and the idea that given certain circumstances, God would have me share that man with another woman or women in this life and forever more in Heaven hurt and scared me. Surely a man couldn’t love all his wives equally, and even if he could…not being his only one would be excruciating.

It seemed so unlike the Father whose love I’d felt and cherished, yet it was true: He had commanded people to practice polygamy in the early days of the restored church. I frantically researched plural marriage in those days and it all only made me feel worse: I read about an angel with a flaming sword commanding Joseph Smith to practice plural marriage even though he was reluctant to hurt his wife like that, God commanding Emma Smith to stay with Joseph or He would give him ‘an hundred wives’. Such disregard for the pain of those involved, plus subjecting 100 random people to a life and eternity of loveless marriage just to punish one person for hesitating to submit to the worst pain of their life…went against everything I thought I knew about God.

Yeah I know that God intended to build up the church and so commanded polygamy to increase the church population, and that this was such an important thing that had to be done and that’s why he responded so harshly to Joseph and Emma’s resistance. But all things are supposed to be possible with God, so surely He could have come up with another way if His daughters’ eternal happiness and romance really mattered to Him. Or He could have tried reasoning with and reassuring them through their fears first at least, and then threatened them last of all else failed.

The ‘fact’(?) that there will be far more righteous women in Heaven than there will be men, and they all need to be sealed to be exalted and so we have no other options but to share husbands in the Celestial Kingdom doesn’t make me feel any better either, so please don’t tell me that.

I feel betrayed by God. How could a loving father do this to his children? I’ve since found it difficult to feel His love, and I think it’s because I’m afraid to open my heart to Him. I don’t want to feel His love and closeness with him, only to remember polygamy and feel betrayed like being doused in cold water all over again.

In my mind, I just can’t reconcile the love I used to feel from God with his command of eternally sharing a spouse—polygamy and allowing a man to be sealed to more than one woman if his former wife dies—is the antithesis of love. Being commanded into it for the purpose of building up the church population/making bodies for our spiritual siblings feels objectifying—no matter how important it may be.
Some might try to tell me: “Children were meant to have that close bond of sharing a body with their mother. A mother’s love is closest to God’s love.” But what’s the use of the child’s need to feel loved is going to expire the day God needs her powers of reproduction? What if her other relationships then? 

Is obtaining a physical body all that matters in this life? Is love between spouses actually irrelevant? Is romantic love just a ruse to get people close enough to make bodies? Why does God command men to love their wives in other scriptures and then command some of them to take on more than they could possibly get to know well and love on top of everything else he has to do in this life? And if the women subjected to plural marriage don’t need a husband’s love after all, then why would anyone else?

It makes me hurt and confused and angry to try and imagine a God cold-hearted enough to not care about his children’s eternal personal relationships with their spouse, and to threaten them when they hesitate, as being kind and patient. I want the latter, but it clashes with the former.

I don’t know what I should expect of Jesus’s nature anymore. 

I’ve prayed and continued to do research over the years and all I can seem to find is stuff like men quickly assuring readers that the men who practiced polygamy were acting under God’s command and that they all made it to Heaven; a story of a teenager who had to let go of her crush on a boy her age to marry a middle aged man; and accusations of not even being pure enough for the kingdom of Heaven if I wouldn’t allow a fellow woman to be sealed to my husband in order to make it into the Celestial Kingdom; claims that: “I know the concept of polygamy is uncomfortable, but have faith in God anyway.”; and other weak crap that doesn’t answer any of my questions. I have never found anything to suggest that the women who participated in polygamy were assured romantic love—if only in the next life—nor any words of reassurance to them from God. 

The God I used to feel close to and the God who commanded his servants to submit to polygamy or be damned, who didn’t care how many people He subjected to the painful practice, nor how young they were, seem like two completely different people to me and like I said, I don’t know how to feel about Him now.

I follow church teachings now only because it’s that or damnation. God is nothing more to me than my God now. I no longer see Him as my father. I don’t want to get married. I see it as nothing more or less than a license to bear children/a ticket into the Celestial Kingdom now.

Does anyone have any advice? Is there actually any hope? 

 

Your problem is likely centered on the fact that you can’t conceive that an infinite and eternal being of perfect love, who is the very living embodiment of perfect justice, mercy and all other divine attributes, is somehow incapable of perfectly and purely loving more than one woman at same time. Perhaps you’re projecting the imperfect nature of fallen, lustful men onto the perfect exalted God who has totally conquered and transcended the fallen nature and it’s fleshly lusts? Does it bother you at all that God the Father is the literal Father of the physical body of his Son, Jesus Christ?

Edited November 11, 2021 by teddyaware

[The Nehor]

Was the love you felt God had for you diminished by God sharing that same love with everyone else on Earth?

That is not an answer but it might be a perspective.

The question of “How could a loving father do this to His children?” is a much more general one and not limited to polygamy. Many of his children are born into degrading and horrible circumstances. You have to confront that reality at some point in your spiritual journey. I suspect that if you move the focus from your own fears and worries about your own marital future and move it to a more charitable “How can this all be allowed to happen to all of us?” that you are more likely to find answers that satisfy.

Good luck.

[Danzo]

I really doubt you are going to find what you need on this board.   I don't really find it useful to try and Justify or condem practices of other people in other times.  Things were done differently back then, people saw things differently and even marriage and romatic love was viewed differently.  People often found a way to be happy dispite their circomstances and found joy in things that we don't feel comfortable with today.   

         My mother and father in law were married in an arranged marriage when she was fourteeen and he was eighteen (not LDS at the time and not in the US).  She had her first child when she was sixteen, she talks about playing with her dolls before the wedding and having no clue what was going to happen.   Yet, more than 50 years later the marriage seems to have worked out (they are inseperable today).  I see people all around me who find their love of their life, who they are wildly attracted to and feel deep romantic love toward, they get married and several years later they hate each other.

     When I first got married, my wife told me she hated the idea of polygamy and told me I couldn't remarry if she died.  We couldn't talk about it at all and she said that if it wasn't for other spiritual experiences she would have left the church over the idea of it.  Now 20 years later she often jokes about needing another wife around the house and has told me that she would want me to remarry if something happend to her. Different perspectives at different times in life. 

Don't base your testimony on the righteousness of Joseph Smith.  D&C section 3 was the first written revelation in the D&C and talks about how bad Joseph had been.   Joseph was told many times that his sins were forgiven (which would indicate that he had sins that needed forgiving).

Don't base your testimony on the the righteousness of the church leaders.  Last week I was called as Elders quorum president.  For me, that is proof enough that isn't calling the most qualified or righteous people as leaders.  I know I wasn't choosen for my ability either. 

I believe in a God that knows how to give good gifts. Anyone who is purified and exalted in the celestial kingdom will be someone that I could live with.  End the end everyone will be sealed to everyone else anyway. I'm sealed to my parents. I am sealed to my wife. My wife is sealed to here parents.  Which means my parents(who live in arizona) are sealed through me to my wifes parents who live in the Mixtec highlands of Oaxaca Mexico. End the end we all will be part of a great family who will be filled with love and Charity and will be cleansed from our flaws and empowerd by the grace of Jesus Christ.   There will be nothing not to like about anyone who makes it to the Celestial Kingdom. 

 

[Tacenda]

8 hours ago, ekilgroe said:

I was born and raised in the church. I used to always feel close to our Heavenly Father and feel strongly that He loved me and considered him my constant companion, the Being who loved me more than I could comprehend, my everything. That all changed when I was a teenager and learned more about polygamy.

At that age I looked forward to someday loving a man and being loved deeply by him in return, and the idea that given certain circumstances, God would have me share that man with another woman or women in this life and forever more in Heaven hurt and scared me. Surely a man couldn’t love all his wives equally, and even if he could…not being his only one would be excruciating.

It seemed so unlike the Father whose love I’d felt and cherished, yet it was true: He had commanded people to practice polygamy in the early days of the restored church. I frantically researched plural marriage in those days and it all only made me feel worse: I read about an angel with a flaming sword commanding Joseph Smith to practice plural marriage even though he was reluctant to hurt his wife like that, God commanding Emma Smith to stay with Joseph or He would give him ‘an hundred wives’. Such disregard for the pain of those involved, plus subjecting 100 random people to a life and eternity of loveless marriage just to punish one person for hesitating to submit to the worst pain of their life…went against everything I thought I knew about God.

Yeah I know that God intended to build up the church and so commanded polygamy to increase the church population, and that this was such an important thing that had to be done and that’s why he responded so harshly to Joseph and Emma’s resistance. But all things are supposed to be possible with God, so surely He could have come up with another way if His daughters’ eternal happiness and romance really mattered to Him. Or He could have tried reasoning with and reassuring them through their fears first at least, and then threatened them last of all else failed.

The ‘fact’(?) that there will be far more righteous women in Heaven than there will be men, and they all need to be sealed to be exalted and so we have no other options but to share husbands in the Celestial Kingdom doesn’t make me feel any better either, so please don’t tell me that.

I feel betrayed by God. How could a loving father do this to his children? I’ve since found it difficult to feel His love, and I think it’s because I’m afraid to open my heart to Him. I don’t want to feel His love and closeness with him, only to remember polygamy and feel betrayed like being doused in cold water all over again.

In my mind, I just can’t reconcile the love I used to feel from God with his command of eternally sharing a spouse—polygamy and allowing a man to be sealed to more than one woman if his former wife dies—is the antithesis of love. Being commanded into it for the purpose of building up the church population/making bodies for our spiritual siblings feels objectifying—no matter how important it may be.
Some might try to tell me: “Children were meant to have that close bond of sharing a body with their mother. A mother’s love is closest to God’s love.” But what’s the use of the child’s need to feel loved is going to expire the day God needs her powers of reproduction? What if her other relationships then? 

Is obtaining a physical body all that matters in this life? Is love between spouses actually irrelevant? Is romantic love just a ruse to get people close enough to make bodies? Why does God command men to love their wives in other scriptures and then command some of them to take on more than they could possibly get to know well and love on top of everything else he has to do in this life? And if the women subjected to plural marriage don’t need a husband’s love after all, then why would anyone else?

It makes me hurt and confused and angry to try and imagine a God cold-hearted enough to not care about his children’s eternal personal relationships with their spouse, and to threaten them when they hesitate, as being kind and patient. I want the latter, but it clashes with the former.

I don’t know what I should expect of Jesus’s nature anymore. 

I’ve prayed and continued to do research over the years and all I can seem to find is stuff like men quickly assuring readers that the men who practiced polygamy were acting under God’s command and that they all made it to Heaven; a story of a teenager who had to let go of her crush on a boy her age to marry a middle aged man; and accusations of not even being pure enough for the kingdom of Heaven if I wouldn’t allow a fellow woman to be sealed to my husband in order to make it into the Celestial Kingdom; claims that: “I know the concept of polygamy is uncomfortable, but have faith in God anyway.”; and other weak crap that doesn’t answer any of my questions. I have never found anything to suggest that the women who participated in polygamy were assured romantic love—if only in the next life—nor any words of reassurance to them from God. 

The God I used to feel close to and the God who commanded his servants to submit to polygamy or be damned, who didn’t care how many people He subjected to the painful practice, nor how young they were, seem like two completely different people to me and like I said, I don’t know how to feel about Him now.

I follow church teachings now only because it’s that or damnation. God is nothing more to me than my God now. I no longer see Him as my father. I don’t want to get married. I see it as nothing more or less than a license to bear children/a ticket into the Celestial Kingdom now.

Does anyone have any advice? Is there actually any hope? 

 

I believe the scriptures are mostly man made. Maybe men gleam things from God, as well as women but think God is far outside the box that we or religion put him in, and it's the God that made every creature large and small, every species of plant life, and magnificent world wonders that is more than any man or woman can make up and put in a religion. I don't listen to what men say about God if they say they know what God wants and tries to preach it to benefit themselves or their misinterpretations. I listen to my moral compass and not the compass that directs others.

Luckily after my faith crisis of finding out about Joseph's polygamy, I somehow kept hold of a creator of some kind and still believe in that being. I hope you can look outside the box and let your compass lead your ❤️.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Tacenda

[Bill “Papa” Lee]

Dear “brother or sister, (it is always hard to tell with screen names) you are all over the place with your, “one and only post”. Also, coming out of the gate with this post, I doubt there will be more, although I hope I am wrong. However, if you believe in the “God of the Bible”, you are condemning many men whose life was define by polygamy, truly great men of God, who (again) were polygamist. In fact, in the New Testament, those who accept Jesus Christ as their Savior, become the “seed of Abraham”, who is by all accounts, a polygamist, and a man who cast out his first son. Also, the only three names (other than Jesus Christ) with whom God identifies his name with, “Abraham, Issac, and Jacob”, are all polygamist. Also Jacob, whose name was changed to “Israel”, was the most notorious, and whose sons became the Father’s of the “Twelve Tribes of Israel”. So maybe you should give this mantra a new perspective.
 

Unless I read you wrong?  

Edited November 12, 2021 by Bill “Papa” Lee

[rpn]

This is not intended to upset you.  

If those who actually lived polygamy were okay with it, why would it upset someone who doesn't/hasn't?  

Do you only feel Their love if They do/act/expect what you approve of?

There is absolutely nothing in Gospel teachings that supports any belief that God will force anyone to live polygamy (yes there is the directive to Emma that sounds like that and whether that was inspired or JS we do not know for sure, canonized or not.  But ultimately we can always choose to reject what They want for us and be okay with whatever consequence happens.  Our leaders tell us it is their job to teach the general rule, and ours to figure out if we are an exception.

Sometimes we do hard things we are asked to do.   Sometimes we cant for some time or always.   But to argue that being asked to do hard things makes us question the love of God is like saying we don't trust Them to have our best interests at heart.

[Calm]

2 hours ago, Bill “Papa” Lee said:

Dear “brother or sister, (it is always hard to tell with screen names) you are all over the place with your, “one and only post”.

You may have accidentally skipped this part or focused on something else she said, but she is a “sister”.  

Quote

At that age I looked forward to someday loving a man and being loved deeply by him in return, and the idea that given certain circumstances, God would have me share that man with another woman or women

 

[Calm]

8 hours ago, strappinglad said:

. If the US government and society at large had not been so violently opposed to polygamy, would the Church still be practicing it today? 

It was actually diminishing in its frequency before the government stepped in to try and stop it and made it into the ultimate demonstration of faith. I think it would have ended up rather rare and possibly shut down even over time to today’s status with changes made based on greater light and knowledge just as we learned that it was better for men and women to be sealed to their parents rather than being adopted spiritually into the families of church leaders by being sealed to them. 

What that would have been I don’t know.

My great great grandmother described the experience of being a plural wife (she was the first with one sister wife) as allowing her to come as close as possible as it is to come in mortal life to experiencing the kind of love we would receive in the Celestial Kingdom. Hers was not originally a marriage of love though, her husband has been engaged but when that fell through, a mutual friend recommended my grandmother and it appears to have worked out well for them both. It was her who went to her husband and told him to get permission to live plural marriage as she felt her family was ready to receive more blessings and she was the one who picked out her sister wife. I haven’t seen anything written by her sister wife though, so don’t know her POV.  She was quite ill much of her life and my grandmother cared for her, which probably contributed to the mutual respect and love (assuming my grandmother’s reports were honest).

To the opening poster:

My own opinion partly based on the argument to justify polygyny that if it is unfair to ask a man to give up the love he committed to and worked with to build a family in the next life, that it is wrong to make him choose between the women he loved is that if polygyny continues in the next life, polyandry will be there as well. Women will have all the blessings that men will have and if plural marriage is truly an eternal blessing, then why would it be withheld by God from women if they desire it in the same way some men desire it.  After all if it is wrong to ask a man to choose between women he loved, it would be wrong to force a woman to choose.
 

Plus I believe the sealings we perform are real and not just paperwork waiting for the real thing to come along later, though of course all sealings need to be confirmed by the Holy Spirit of Promise.  And since we now seal a dead woman to all of her husbands once they are all no longer living, why would those sealings not be as respected as the sealings performed for living and dead men?

However, this is a reasoned opinion, it feels right, but I cannot claim I have a spiritual witness of it, so I very well may be wrong.

Basically it makes sense to me that whatever the rules will be, they will be the same for women as they are for men.  I see nothing in scripture that requires a difference of treatment in the eternities. We will be one in the Celestial Kingdom, one heart, one mind, one soul, so it makes sense to me it will be one glory as well and no need for one man to build up kingdoms through multiple wives for himself when he shares in all the Kingdoms that God has. 

[Calm]

You may be interested in these from Valerie Hudson if you have not read them before. I have heard a number of Saints say listening to her perspective is the first time plural marriage in our church history made sense to them. It has been awhile since I read them, so I hope I get the right articles. If not, I suggest googling her name to find other resources.  Bedtime is upon me or I would doublecheck them myself, but I am working hard to shift my sleep cycle and this is the first time in my 60+ years I am having success, so not going to risk putting off my shutdown. 

https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/conference/august-2010/the-two-trees (think her talk is available on YouTube if you want the slide presentation, but I prefer transcripts so using this link)

https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/conference/august-2011/a-reconciliation-of-polygamy

 

Edited November 12, 2021 by Calm

[Olmec Donald]

30 minutes ago, Calm said:

[I]f polygyny continues in the next life, polyandry will be there as well. Women will have all the blessings that men will have and if plural marriage is truly an eternal blessing, then why would it be withheld by God from women if they desire it in the same way some men desire it.  After all if it is wrong to ask a man to choose between women he loved, it would be wrong to force a woman to choose.

... Basically it makes sense to me that whatever the rules will be, they will be the same for women as they are for men.  I see nothing in scripture that requires a difference of treatment in the eternities. We will be one in the Celestial Kingdom, one heart, one mind, one soul... 

I agree with all of this.

And in a realm where there is no such thing as time (such that attention given to one is not attention denied to another), where jealousy does not exist, where love is not a scarce commodity that must be rationed, and where the other person's joy is our joy, yup.  It could work.  

Edited November 12, 2021 by Olmec Donald

[MustardSeed]

Ekilgroe,

I think it's OK that you feel hurt by God over this. I'm sorry that you feel such a wrestle. I too wrestled with it, deeply, when I first married.  

You are not alone.

Mustardseed

[Calm]

28 minutes ago, MustardSeed said:

Ekilgroe,

I think it's OK that you feel hurt by God over this. I'm sorry that you feel such a wrestle. I too wrestled with it, deeply, when I first married.  

You are not alone.

Mustardseed

I let myself get distracted and here I am still up, ach. I need a mom to tell me “lights out”.  

She is most definitely not alone.  I actually feel like I am the odd ball at times because I have never been troubled by it, though I haven’t had a typical view of polygamy for a long time…not sure I ever had a one.  Probably all those hours spent discussing this and more with my mother as a preteen and teen and young adult and onward till we had no more deep discussions at all (she got dementia, the family mourned deeply that loss even more than we mourned her eventual death as her curiosity and wonder towards the Gospel was such an inseparable part of her that has enriched all of our lives all of our life and still has this year she has been gone.)

I remember Mom said once she could see herself enjoying the company of a sister wife if she was someone who shared an interest in talking about the gospel in the deep and sometimes musty paths .  My father was as devoted, but was a doer of the Word while Mom was an explorer of the Word.  He too was not that typical, but it was his solid pragmatism that made him that way, if he saw something traditional that seemed to serve no real purpose, he saw no reason not to dispense with it.

I am a member of FAIR, an apologetic organization that defends the Church with faithful, accurate to the best of our ability answers (mentioning this just in case you haven’t heard of us).  People send us in letters every day. If I look at only the topics that are view significantly different between men and women, polygyny/plural marriage is top of the women’s list of issues…by a long shot.  Especially if referring to the single topic emails as opposed to those who send in multiple questions at the same time. My view, which may be biased as a female, is that polygyny is the most intense issue we deal with at FAIR. 
 If you are concerned about whether we are trustworthy or some apostate organization with a hidden agenda , we have been recommended as an additional study reference on the church’s website (not bragging, just showing we are still on the rails).

Look for us towards the bottom:  https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/si/questions/plural-marriage?lang=eng

We changed our name back to the original sort of, originally Foundation for Apologetic Issues andResearch iirc.  Then we were FairMormon…to make us easier to recognize as church related group, and back to FAIR, for obvious reason, now standing for Faithful Answers, Informed Response 

More resources:  https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/answers/Mormonism_and_polygamy

And off to sleep for real this time. Night. 

[MustardSeed]

8 hours ago, Calm said:

I let myself get distracted and here I am still up, ach. I need a mom to tell me “lights out”.  

She is most definitely not alone.  I actually feel like I am the odd ball at times because I have never been troubled by it, though I haven’t had a typical view of polygamy for a long time…not sure I ever had a one.  Probably all those hours spent discussing this and more with my mother as a preteen and teen and young adult and onward till we had no more deep discussions at all (she got dementia, the family mourned deeply that loss even more than we mourned her eventual death as her curiosity and wonder towards the Gospel was such an inseparable part of her that has enriched all of our lives all of our life and still has this year she has been gone.)

I remember Mom said once she could see herself enjoying the company of a sister wife if she was someone who shared an interest in talking about the gospel in the deep and sometimes musty paths .  My father was as devoted, but was a doer of the Word while Mom was an explorer of the Word.  He too was not that typical, but it was his solid pragmatism that made him that way, if he saw something traditional that seemed to serve no real purpose, he saw no reason not to dispense with it.

I am a member of FAIR, an apologetic organization that defends the Church with faithful, accurate to the best of our ability answers (mentioning this just in case you haven’t heard of us).  People send us in letters every day. If I look at only the topics that are view significantly different between men and women, polygyny/plural marriage is top of the women’s list of issues…by a long shot.  Especially if referring to the single topic emails as opposed to those who send in multiple questions at the same time. My view, which may be biased as a female, is that polygyny is the most intense issue we deal with at FAIR. 
 If you are concerned about whether we are trustworthy or some apostate organization with a hidden agenda , we have been recommended as an additional study reference on the church’s website (not bragging, just showing we are still on the rails).

Look for us towards the bottom:  https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/si/questions/plural-marriage?lang=eng

We changed our name back to the original sort of, originally Foundation for Apologetic Issues andResearch iirc.  Then we were FairMormon…to make us easier to recognize as church related group, and back to FAIR, for obvious reason, now standing for Faithful Answers, Informed Response 

More resources:  https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/answers/Mormonism_and_polygamy

And off to sleep for real this time. Night. 

When I was first married and the topic of polygamy was very upsetting to me, it was super invalidating and only made me more angry when people said "it will all work out" and "Polygamy might be fun!" and "Think of the perks!"  and "Abraham did it" - even the op's examples of "It was necessary for church growth" and "Too many women not enough men" were major turn offs for me.  I was bitter and angry.

Since then I have come to decide for ME that if I don't want to practice polygamy, I will not practice polygamy.  If polygamy is a top tier celestial deal, then I would not be happy in top tier and God won't let me be unhappy if I've been my best self.   I'm going to end up WHEREVER Im HAPPIEST and that is enough or me.  If that makes me rebellious then so be it.  I can live with that. 

I also leave space for the possibility that men have interpreted things very wrong.  Maybe polygamy is not actually a higher law but a lesser law.  Men have been known to be wrong and self serving before.  ( Yes as have women, but women have no voice in this so move along.)

My God will not allow me to be miserable for eternity.  I have sacrificed far too much far too willingly to believe that God would rip his rug out from my feet over something as silly as polygamy - something I associate with cults and child sexual abuse and stupid TV shows. 

[Calm]

1 hour ago, MustardSeed said:

When I was first married and the topic of polygamy was very upsetting to me, it was super invalidating and only made me more angry when people said "it will all work out" and "Polygamy might be fun!" and "Think of the perks!"  and "Abraham did it" - even the op's examples of "It was necessary for church growth" and "Too many women not enough men" were major turn offs for me.  I was bitter and angry.

Since then I have come to decide for ME that if I don't want to practice polygamy, I will not practice polygamy.  If polygamy is a top tier celestial deal, then I would not be happy in top tier and God won't let me be unhappy if I've been my best self.   I'm going to end up WHEREVER Im HAPPIEST and that is enough or me.  If that makes me rebellious then so be it.  I can live with that. 

This is the most common reaction to plural marriage I have seen from women expressing concern.  Not saying this is the most common reaction of women or even of women who are concerned, just speaking of the subset of those who I have heard verbalize their concerns.

Quote

I also leave space for the possibility that men have interpreted things very wrong.  Maybe polygamy is not actually a higher law but a lesser law.  Men have been known to be wrong and self serving before.  ( Yes as have women, but women have no voice in this so move along.)

My God will not allow me to be miserable for eternity.  I have sacrificed far too much far too willingly to believe that God would rip his rug out from my feet over something as silly as polygamy…. 

I very much I agree with this.  This has been pretty much my position for as long as I can remember.

I grew up with polygamy as relatively normal, though in the past as my grandmother would talk of her Aunt Polly and I was well aware of all my ancestors on my mom’s side being polygamists.  One is buried in SLC Cemetery next to three or four wives and I remember walking around those graves when I was 7 or 8.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Calm

[Tacenda]

4 hours ago, MustardSeed said:

When I was first married and the topic of polygamy was very upsetting to me, it was super invalidating and only made me more angry when people said "it will all work out" and "Polygamy might be fun!" and "Think of the perks!"  and "Abraham did it" - even the op's examples of "It was necessary for church growth" and "Too many women not enough men" were major turn offs for me.  I was bitter and angry.

Since then I have come to decide for ME that if I don't want to practice polygamy, I will not practice polygamy.  If polygamy is a top tier celestial deal, then I would not be happy in top tier and God won't let me be unhappy if I've been my best self.   I'm going to end up WHEREVER Im HAPPIEST and that is enough or me.  If that makes me rebellious then so be it.  I can live with that. 

I also leave space for the possibility that men have interpreted things very wrong.  Maybe polygamy is not actually a higher law but a lesser law.  Men have been known to be wrong and self serving before.  ( Yes as have women, but women have no voice in this so move along.)

My God will not allow me to be miserable for eternity.  I have sacrificed far too much far too willingly to believe that God would rip his rug out from my feet over something as silly as polygamy - something I associate with cults and child sexual abuse and stupid TV shows. 

Concur with the bold. 

[Tacenda]

13 hours ago, Calm said:

I let myself get distracted and here I am still up, ach. I need a mom to tell me “lights out”.  

She is most definitely not alone.  I actually feel like I am the odd ball at times because I have never been troubled by it, though I haven’t had a typical view of polygamy for a long time…not sure I ever had a one.  Probably all those hours spent discussing this and more with my mother as a preteen and teen and young adult and onward till we had no more deep discussions at all (she got dementia, the family mourned deeply that loss even more than we mourned her eventual death as her curiosity and wonder towards the Gospel was such an inseparable part of her that has enriched all of our lives all of our life and still has this year she has been gone.)

I remember Mom said once she could see herself enjoying the company of a sister wife if she was someone who shared an interest in talking about the gospel in the deep and sometimes musty paths .  My father was as devoted, but was a doer of the Word while Mom was an explorer of the Word.  He too was not that typical, but it was his solid pragmatism that made him that way, if he saw something traditional that seemed to serve no real purpose, he saw no reason not to dispense with it.

I am a member of FAIR, an apologetic organization that defends the Church with faithful, accurate to the best of our ability answers (mentioning this just in case you haven’t heard of us).  People send us in letters every day. If I look at only the topics that are view significantly different between men and women, polygyny/plural marriage is top of the women’s list of issues…by a long shot.  Especially if referring to the single topic emails as opposed to those who send in multiple questions at the same time. My view, which may be biased as a female, is that polygyny is the most intense issue we deal with at FAIR. 
 If you are concerned about whether we are trustworthy or some apostate organization with a hidden agenda , we have been recommended as an additional study reference on the church’s website (not bragging, just showing we are still on the rails).

Look for us towards the bottom:  https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/si/questions/plural-marriage?lang=eng

We changed our name back to the original sort of, originally Foundation for Apologetic Issues andResearch iirc.  Then we were FairMormon…to make us easier to recognize as church related group, and back to FAIR, for obvious reason, now standing for Faithful Answers, Informed Response 

More resources:  https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/answers/Mormonism_and_polygamy

And off to sleep for real this time. Night. 

Good to read that you're sleeping better!

[Calm]

9 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

Good to read that you're sleeping better!

Now I just have to figure out how to adjust my drugs so I don’t wake up sick from missing a dose, lol.  The chemistry experiment continues. 

[Bill “Papa” Lee]

19 hours ago, Calm said:

You may have accidentally skipped this part or focused on something else she said, but she is a “sister”.  

 

Opps

[The Nehor]

On 11/11/2021 at 10:18 AM, ekilgroe said:

I was born and raised in the church. I used to always feel close to our Heavenly Father and feel strongly that He loved me and considered him my constant companion, the Being who loved me more than I could comprehend, my everything. That all changed when I was a teenager and learned more about polygamy.

At that age I looked forward to someday loving a man and being loved deeply by him in return, and the idea that given certain circumstances, God would have me share that man with another woman or women in this life and forever more in Heaven hurt and scared me. Surely a man couldn’t love all his wives equally, and even if he could…not being his only one would be excruciating.

It seemed so unlike the Father whose love I’d felt and cherished, yet it was true: He had commanded people to practice polygamy in the early days of the restored church. I frantically researched plural marriage in those days and it all only made me feel worse: I read about an angel with a flaming sword commanding Joseph Smith to practice plural marriage even though he was reluctant to hurt his wife like that, God commanding Emma Smith to stay with Joseph or He would give him ‘an hundred wives’. Such disregard for the pain of those involved, plus subjecting 100 random people to a life and eternity of loveless marriage just to punish one person for hesitating to submit to the worst pain of their life…went against everything I thought I knew about God.

Yeah I know that God intended to build up the church and so commanded polygamy to increase the church population, and that this was such an important thing that had to be done and that’s why he responded so harshly to Joseph and Emma’s resistance. But all things are supposed to be possible with God, so surely He could have come up with another way if His daughters’ eternal happiness and romance really mattered to Him. Or He could have tried reasoning with and reassuring them through their fears first at least, and then threatened them last of all else failed.

The ‘fact’(?) that there will be far more righteous women in Heaven than there will be men, and they all need to be sealed to be exalted and so we have no other options but to share husbands in the Celestial Kingdom doesn’t make me feel any better either, so please don’t tell me that.

I feel betrayed by God. How could a loving father do this to his children? I’ve since found it difficult to feel His love, and I think it’s because I’m afraid to open my heart to Him. I don’t want to feel His love and closeness with him, only to remember polygamy and feel betrayed like being doused in cold water all over again.

In my mind, I just can’t reconcile the love I used to feel from God with his command of eternally sharing a spouse—polygamy and allowing a man to be sealed to more than one woman if his former wife dies—is the antithesis of love. Being commanded into it for the purpose of building up the church population/making bodies for our spiritual siblings feels objectifying—no matter how important it may be.
Some might try to tell me: “Children were meant to have that close bond of sharing a body with their mother. A mother’s love is closest to God’s love.” But what’s the use of the child’s need to feel loved is going to expire the day God needs her powers of reproduction? What if her other relationships then? 

Is obtaining a physical body all that matters in this life? Is love between spouses actually irrelevant? Is romantic love just a ruse to get people close enough to make bodies? Why does God command men to love their wives in other scriptures and then command some of them to take on more than they could possibly get to know well and love on top of everything else he has to do in this life? And if the women subjected to plural marriage don’t need a husband’s love after all, then why would anyone else?

It makes me hurt and confused and angry to try and imagine a God cold-hearted enough to not care about his children’s eternal personal relationships with their spouse, and to threaten them when they hesitate, as being kind and patient. I want the latter, but it clashes with the former.

I don’t know what I should expect of Jesus’s nature anymore. 

I’ve prayed and continued to do research over the years and all I can seem to find is stuff like men quickly assuring readers that the men who practiced polygamy were acting under God’s command and that they all made it to Heaven; a story of a teenager who had to let go of her crush on a boy her age to marry a middle aged man; and accusations of not even being pure enough for the kingdom of Heaven if I wouldn’t allow a fellow woman to be sealed to my husband in order to make it into the Celestial Kingdom; claims that: “I know the concept of polygamy is uncomfortable, but have faith in God anyway.”; and other weak crap that doesn’t answer any of my questions. I have never found anything to suggest that the women who participated in polygamy were assured romantic love—if only in the next life—nor any words of reassurance to them from God. 

The God I used to feel close to and the God who commanded his servants to submit to polygamy or be damned, who didn’t care how many people He subjected to the painful practice, nor how young they were, seem like two completely different people to me and like I said, I don’t know how to feel about Him now.

I follow church teachings now only because it’s that or damnation. God is nothing more to me than my God now. I no longer see Him as my father. I don’t want to get married. I see it as nothing more or less than a license to bear children/a ticket into the Celestial Kingdom now.

Does anyone have any advice? Is there actually any hope? 

 

Try to see your natural repugnance to the concept in a different light.

This is a less abbreviated version of one of the articles Calm shared earlier:

https://squaretwo.org/Sq2ArticleReadersPuzzlePolygamy.html

It compares the sacrifice of Isaac to the exceptional command to practice polygamy.           

Quote

 

We see other things in a new light, as well.  In mortality, when God does command polygamy, he understands it is an exceptional sacrifice by the innocent of the joy that would be theirs if they could obey the law instead, despite the paradoxical joy given to the innocent sacrificer.  Therefore, if his righteous daughters and sons weep because of polygamy--even in times when he commands it--he is not upset at them, but he weeps when they weep because, like Abraham, they are willing to sacrifice and suffer for a time that God’s work of love might be accomplished.  And, like Christ, they willingly make a sacrifice that the law itself cannot demand of them because that sacrifice provides the blessings of eternal life for the many.  Our polygamous forebears in the early Church are due all our honor for the sacrifices they made.

            Since God is not indifferent between monogamy and polygamy for it appears he views polygamy as a sacrifice in similitude of the sacrifice of his Only Begotten Son, then his love dictates that at the earliest possible moment when the exceptional commandment to depart from the law can be lifted, he will do so.   If no greater good can come from a Christlike sacrifice, it becomes meaningless and gratuitous suffering. Indeed, those who desire to practice polygamy in times when God has not commanded it are in spiritual chaos.  That desire would be analogous to Abraham, after hearing the message of the angel and seeing the ram, proceeding to sacrifice Isaac anyway as a testimony of his faithfulness to God.  We can only surmise that from God’s point of view, such an act would constitute anything but a testimony of faithfulness!

 

It is okay to see polygamy as a bad thing.

Quote

If we as a culture have lost the capacity to see God-commanded polygamy as the Abrahamic sacrifice God tells us it is, if we have lost the capacity to see that God actively desires there be an escape for the righteous who have obeyed this exceptional commandment, then we have lost something profoundly precious.  We have lost the vision of the greatness of God’s love for his children.  To lose that vision brings “the gall of bitterness,” as Mormon remarked about others who similarly placed constraints on God’s love of the innocent, for we “deny” the “mercies” of God (Moroni 8:14, 23).  If cultural misinterpretations cause the women and men of the Church to mourn over polygamy, either because they mistakenly believe that God is indifferent between sacrifice and nonsacrifice and so no escape from this sacrifice will be provided by God or because they are led to feel that they are selfish and not righteous if they feel pain at the thought of polygamy, then these cultural misinterpretations are actively harming our people.  We then have a duty to root out these cultural misinterpretations from our midst, lest they cause great spiritual mischief (Moroni 8:6).

           And mischief they have surely caused.  The apostate Mormon polygamous cults are but the most observable manifestation—child trafficking, sex slavery, kidnapping, brainwashing, horrific abuse, blackmail . . . the sins of these cults are red as scarlet.  But there are more insidious forms of mischief among mainstream Mormons in the US.  In informal online surveys, up to 80% of respondents, primarily from the Mountain West area, believe that the Church will reinstitute polygamy before or at the time of the Second Coming.  Many also believe—erroneously, for this is not Mormon doctrine--that polygamy is a requirement for the celestial kingdom.  As a result, we find men with celestial lust in their hearts, calculating how many wives they will receive as a reward in the next life, not unlike obsessing over 72 virgins.  Such men see women as “biological vessels” to increase their “priesthood kingdoms,” and not as fully human beings.  On the female side of the aisle, we see good LDS women who cringe at the thought of going to heaven, and admit to themselves they do not want to go there.  I have known women who do not want to marry in the temple, for fear a temple marriage is a one-way ticket to heavenly polygamy in the next life.  I have even known women who have worked very hard not to love their husbands, so their hearts won’t be broken when he takes another wife in the next life.  We also have women who cope emotionally by convincing themselves that God will turn them into completely different beings who will embrace polygamy.

It is okay to not be happy about polygamy. It is probably healthier than being completely okay with it.

[Olmec Donald]

20 hours ago, Calm said:

It was her who went to her husband and told him to get permission to live plural marriage as she felt her family was ready to receive more blessings and she was the one who picked out her sister wife.  [emphasis Donald's]

The impression I came away with, from things I read and from conversations with several modern-day polygamists, is that what you describe here is the most successful model for polygyny.

16 hours ago, Calm said:

More resources:  https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/answers/Mormonism_and_polygamy

I don't think I've ever actually been to the "FAIR" website before.  That page on polygamy impressed me enormously.  I clicked on the "polyandry" link and it was thorough and educational and unflinching.  Stirring what I found there into the pot now.  Kudos to you and your group.

Edited November 13, 2021 by Olmec Donald