Today, I’ll talk about men being sealed to multiple women, either in this life, like my great-great-grandmother, or serial polygamy as practiced by two of our current First Presidency. For those that have been following my posts over the years, you know this is personal, as I have a daughter that was sealed to her first husband who died, and then got remarried to a man that was sealed to his deceased wife. I wrote about it 5 years ago.
This seems like a simple enough question that a Church with direct revelation from God should have an answer to. Now, there are, of course, silly things we don’t know about God, like can He make a rock so big that He can’t lift? But the purpose of this series is to address questions that the Church should answer because they are of concern to many church members. For the above question, it is (or should be) of concern to over 50% of the members (female) and a smaller number of members (men) that are concerned for their wife’s/sister’s/mother’s feelings.
We know this is of such a concern that it was even addressed in General Conference by Elder Oaks four years ago.
My dear brothers and sisters, a letter I received some time ago introduces the subject of my talk. The writer was contemplating a temple marriage to a man whose eternal companion had died. She would be a second wife. She asked this question: would she be able to have her own house in the next life, or would she have to live with her husband and his first wife? I just told her to trust the Lord.
Oct 2019 GC: Trust in the Lord
So let me translate what Elder Oaks said into plain English: “We don’t know jack”. Yet, this is such an important question that women are writing to Elder Oaks about it. My daughter did not find that talk funny, even though if you listen to the talk linked above, you’ll hear the congregation laughing.
Now this is something that our leaders used to know a great deal about. Brigham Young said multiple times that polygamy was required for exaltation. Probably the most famous of those quotes is:
The only men who become Gods, even the Sons of God, are those who enter into polygamy. Others attain unto a glory and may even be permitted to come into the presence of the Father and the Son; but they cannot reign as kings in glory, because they had blessings offered unto them, and they refused to accept them.
Journal of Discourses, Vol.11, p.268 – p.269, Brigham Young, August 19, 1866
You can find many more quotes here.
Therefore, according to Brigham Young, there will be polygamy in the afterlife. Yet, today’s leaders would rather not talk about it, seemed to have forgot about it, and will tell you to “trust the Lord”. I believe there is only one way that the Church could answer this and keep everybody happy; both polygamous and monogamous marriages will be exalted. Everybody is happy. Other options include only monogamous marriages being exalted or only polygamous marriages being exalted, which create monumental problems with our theology, let alone the PR disaster from the later.
Speaking of bad PR, I usually use Pixabay to find royalty-free images for my blog posts. For this post, I typed in “polygamy” in the search bar and the above temple photo was the only one that showed up as royalty-free. Usually there are hundreds for any given subject. Not a good look for the Church that is trying to shed it’s skeletons in the closet that the only photo related to polygamy is one of an LDS temple!
So what are your thoughts on Elder Oak’s talk? Is this a legitimate question that should be answered, or am I straining at a gnat?
Image by John R Perry from Pixabay
Wheat & Tares 
I think when one attempts to analyse a silly idea… that there a god and he cares about how many times and to how many people a person is married, one inevitably gets deeper into silliness. God presumably created the entire infinite universe. Like, vast and no doubt full of various intelligent life forms. So is it likely he’ll have trouble mixing and matching humans with more than one partner in the afterlife? I doubt it.
There is always the question if these “letters” are real,fabricated, or a mixture. The question posed – do I get my own house in the afterlife – seems to be a very shallow one IMO. This woman isn’t concerned about being one wife of many? She’s not concerned that she and her partner are one unit? Her main concern is about her housing situation? The use of this question, whether real or not, indicates a dismissive attitude of women in general. Sadly, I see this reflected in the attitude of current leadership toward women in general.
I don’t think you’re straining at a gnat. In general, questions that women have (whether trivial or paramount) are dismissed with pat sayings like “the Lord will work it out”. If these men were actually prophets that actually commune with the Lord they could come up with better answers, or at least have empathy and honesty instead of mocking and dismissing attitudes.
I feel that the church completely and wholly believes that polygamy is an eternal principle. Polygamist sealings are standard already. They avoid talking about it because a large percentage of the women would rebel if they clearly knew their faith held this as a foundational principle. Although one of the Articles of Faith says we believe in being honest, the church is not honest with its membership regarding their stand on polygamy. They’re not honest about a lot of things…
Interesting concept and the TSCC should give a direct answer. Members deserve that much respect since they are being asked to commit by being married in a temple. Surely God is not afraid of the answer.
I think “we don’t know” is the correct answer in very many cases, especially for questions around polygamy. Brigham Young and others were pretty clear about importance but not about mechanics. For my two cents, there is a patriarchal model in which everything revolves around a man in the center. Often you can make sense of how polygamy works from that man’s point of view. But not from the pov of the women and children. There is also a network model where the objective is to be linked in to a giant web of humanity. That model is appealing in a cosmic order kind of way, but it doesn’t answer the questions that come up now that we’ve spent more than a century post Manifesto emphasizing nuclear families and the much narrower one man-one woman form of marriage.
I do find a lot of Mormon men including leaders shrugging in a “not important” or “who cares” way. I don’t know any Mormon women who don’t care or don’t worry about these questions. If we’re going to have conference talks on the subject, I suggest we ask the women. It’s not a joking matter.
This is, in fact, one issue that troubles my 95 yr old mother-in-law.
Her first husband was a non-member who ended up joining the church and they eventually got sealed in the temple.
Some years later they divorced. She consulted her bishop whether or not she should get a temple divorce from that marriage. Her bishop told her no—not to worry—that in the next life she doesn’t have to be with someone she doesn’t want to be with.
She then met and married a widower who was sealed to his first wife. She was not sealed to him because he was sealed to his first wife and she did not want to be in a polygamous marriage ever, and certainly not for eternity.
But she worries about the hereafter and that she won’t be with her family.
I think indeed they should say “God will work it out” as Oaks said. But they should change the rules and essentially allow anyone to be sealed to anyone they want to be sealed to. Then really have faith and let God work it out.
Before the 1980s people were often sealed to non family members. Jane Manning, a black woman was even sealed to Joseph Smith as a servant. Many people were randomly sealed to high up church leaders because they had no member family to be sealed to and I guess it felt good to be sealed to a celebrity of sorts.
Make it equal. Let women be sealed to as many husbands as they need to be just like Oaks and Nelson. Let God work out the details in the next life.
And while we are discussing this, if you do any family history work you know anyone person who has a child with anyone can be sealed in the temple after death to that person and their children. Obviously both women and men have kids with multiple people. We just deal them all up and let God work it out. We seal up adoptions as well of course so this isn’t about biology.
On family search ALL legal marriage is recorded as a marital connection on the family tree. This is totally fair even with current theology because with intersex people it’s difficult to determine what their actual sex is. Intersex people can write a letter and provide documentation and have the First Presidency change their sex in the records.
So same sex marriage appears in family trees on family search. I suggest they let them be sealed too. Let asexual people be sealed to who they chose to be legally married to for legal rather than sexual purposes.
This is a missionary issue. My sister in law joined the church and married my brother in law. But she won’t be sealed because he is still married to his first wife.
I appreciate Elder Oaks faith and willingness to admit uncertainty. But he needs to extend that and let go of his control and certainty that the sealing power should only be extended in a patriarchal polygamist way (monogamy is the first step in polygamy).
If you don’t know, and you don’t, quit pretending you do. Let God work it out.
Then there’s Wilfred Woodruff’s version, where he invited women to join him in the temple on his birthday (70th, 71st and 72nd) to do proxy work for dozens of women who were then sealed to him as wives. (Some didn’t need the proxy work, though, as they’d died before age 8.) At least once, the party afterward included wedding cake. There is a lot of gross history with polygamy that church leaders really need to deal with.(https://exponentii.org/blog/mary-jane-wilford-woodruff-and-the-267-dead-wives/)
Sealing as a concept sounds nice buts it’s messy once you get into the details. For example I just learned that if a couple married in the temple has one spouse leave the church, the sealing for the faithful member remains intact but the sealing for the leaving spouse is void. How does that make sense – that half of the couple is sealed and the other half isn’t sealed?? It’s like the only thing that seems matters to God (or maybe I should say the church) is that you’re sealed to someone – doesn’t matter who. The problem is that it *does* matter to *individuals* who they are sealed to – because that’s what sealing means – that is the only person God sanctions you to live with (and btw have sex with) for all eternity.
@Bishop Bill there is another option, a universalist option: everyone (or at least anyone with an ounce of goodness) is exalted eventually. Married or not. Many people who just want to see their kids.
My refrain these days is that I don’t want to live with a god / father who doesn’t think I’m worthy. Not a loving father in my book and not one worth worshiping. Going full circle, sealing sounds nice until you ask for any detail whatsoever.
I remember like yesterday the Oaks talk. I remember his dismissive demeaner. I remember the forced laughter from the audience. This was 2019, right before I left the Church. You could call it one of my last a-ha moments, right along with RMN’s sad heaven talk, that opened my eyes.
TBMs like to believe that anti-Mormon podcasts and web sites push active members out of the Church. No, it’s GC talks from 2 of the top 3 leaders of the Church that do the most damage ^^^^^
josh h:
Oaks’ dismissive and arrogant humor toward that woman was a turning point for me, too.
In response to your question Bishop Bill:
my feelings on Oaks’ un-Christlike response was to want to throw a brick at my TV screen, well, not at the TV really, but towards the bully at the pulpit. My thoughts? Yes, such a question deserved to be heard, and to be taken seriously. Oaks had a chance to mourn with she who mourned, but chose to make light of her pain. I don’t pretend to understand God’s thinking or assume to speak on his behalf. My perspective is that polygamy as practiced in the Church is not of God, was not of God, and is not required by God for exaltation. And the Church’s current stance/non-stance stands in the way of its receiving revelation regarding Heavenly Mother. One mother? Countless mothers? Add to the mix the prohibition against women being ordained to priesthood offices, again, in my limited perspective, not of God but a way to keep women dependent on men, like polygamy does. But I digress.
I like lws329’s idea. Seal anyone to anyone else and let God sort out all the situations in the next life, rather than favoring men in this life. Make everyone trust God to work things out.
Many faithful young lds men will not have a serious, courting relationship with a young faithful lds woman whose first husband died, because our doctrine (when we do supposedly know Jack) teaches that the woman’s offspring will be sealed to the husband she married in the temple. In such circumstances, the sealing to her first husband would need to be cancelled if the new couple desired that their children be sealed to the second.
I know some people this applies to. One later married out of the church and didn’t return. Another remained single.
That’s a messy can of worms, when you think through the possible scenarios, like children from both marriages, some sealed to their mother and a man who is not their father.
Another aspect: one time I read that Brigham Young complained about having to raise some of Joseph Smith’s eternal offspring. BY was the children’s biological father, but these were children of JS’s widows.
It’s hard to imagine healthy bonding between BY and these children he “fathered”.
^^All of the above is how I understand it – please correct me if I’m wrong.
Sasso, I blogged about that exact problem a few years ago, the so called “damaged goods” problem that widowed LDS women find themselves in. https://wheatandtares.org/2017/11/05/the-lds-dating-crises-part-2/
On the contrary, I think this is a difficult question and the church has a big problem when people think they know the answer to this question. The worldly analog to the sealing doctrine is family law, an entire specialty of law practice. I don’t see why it should get less complicated when we extend the concept into eternity.
It is just not easy to take a temporal relation ship of marriage, where two people agree to be with each other until they die, unless they get divorced or annulled, and turn that in to an eternal relationship with just one person. If everyone has to be sealed/married to exactly one person to be exalted, then it would seem [1] necessarily there can’t be an odd number of people receiving exaltation, and if it has to be a straight marriage then the number of exalted men and women must necessarily be equal, unless a person can be exalted without their spouse.
The problem is the church policies regarding sealing are unequal and unfair because church leaders think they know so much about the afterlife. They think they know that marriage in the afterlife closely resembles marriage in this life. They think they know that there will be More women than men in Heaven.
If church leaders would acknowledge they don’t know Jack they could change the policies and make the sealing policies more fair.
——
[1] I say “seem” because it isn’t literally true. If the number of people/spirits is not finite, then they need not be equally in number.
The problem with asking the Church for clarity on this issue is that I would not trust our leaders’ answer on it any further than I can throw them, particularly not given their historical and present views on women and the fact that the top two guys are eternal polygamists.
I agree 100% with lws329 that we should seal ’em all and let God sort ’em out. But no, instead, we’ve got mean-spirited jokes being told at women’s expense in General Conference by someone who is literally sealed to two women. I will never forget that moment, nor will I forget the congregation’s laughter that followed.
Most women in the Church are deeply troubled by the spectre of polygamy. But to leaders and to that congregation, we are a punchline.
With IWS and Angela on this one…
Bizarrely our RS President tried to use Oak’s talk for a lesson shortly after that conference. It didn’t go well.. no small part of that was down to my remarks.. oh well!
I wanted to add that this sealing tradition also impacts children, and their relationships with their parents.
For instance, I have a friend that was raised in the church, went inactive and married a nonmember. They had a child and then divorced. My friend met with the missionaries because she wanted to reactivate and be sealed to her child. The missionaries explained that if she were a man she could do that, but as a woman she would have to be married to a man and sealed in the temple to that man for her child to be sealed to her (and the step or adoptive father).
So she didn’t reactivate. Years later she married and her husband joined the church. Her child was now an adult. For her to be sealed to them she would have to reactivate and reject her biological father in order to be sealed to her mother who was now sealed to another guy. She loved her biological father. Her mom’s husband is a good guy but not her dad. She shouldn’t be asked to reject her biological father in order to be sealed to her mother. This is emotionally all wrong.
The preisthood is not equivalent to motherhood, not by a long shot. A man with the priesthood can be sealed to his child. A mother on her own cannot. A woman or child is only of value in the context of the sealing power as it is set up, if they are of value to a man holding the priesthood.
Reread D & C section 132. Polygamy is the entire context of the sealing power as explained in this section. The patriarchal order of men hosting women is the entire context of temple sealings. I agree with Rockwell that this isn’t easily changed, even by well meaning leaders that might like to.
However, ultimately, this can be devastating to actual family connections and to mental and spiritual health. If we, as a church genuinely want to support the family and children of God and full partnership in marriages, this patriarchal system needs to change it’s center from men, and make room for everyone.
Regarding Oaks’ talk, no one that I know of personally laughed at the expense of the woman. They were laughing in nervous anticipation of how they themselves might respond to such a question in need of an answer, and how Oaks would respond. Maybe I just hang out with a different crowd, but I think the assumption of malevolence or disregard here is telling.
I’ve thought about these questions from time to time, but the idea that Heaven, by its very definition, would be a place where all parties are happy and satisfied, ultimately leaves me content with a “wait and see” approach. I’d concede that’s probably easier for me to do as a male, although I personally do know more divorced men who have civilly remarried widows still very much in love with their deceased husbands than I do women who are second spouses of widower husbands. I’m guessing I’m an outlier though.
Toad, I think it was actually a commenter on this blog that pointed out once that the sealing ceremony never actually says “to each other,” though LDS teachings make that more obvious. I feel like in recent years, while there has been no less emphasis on forever families, there has been more emphasis on personal, temporal, and spiritual blessings that come from the sealing itself—blessings that ultimately don’t leave if your spouse does.
It appears from an historical perspective that polygamy was a failed social experiment dreamed up by JS and exaggerated by BY. God wasn’t in the loop. D&C 132 needs to edited
Let any man or woman be married to any number of spouses they like, but only one at a time. Then assume it will be sorted out in heaven.
I think the way the church handles polygamy amounts to emotional abuse. It’s cruel.
Polygamy is also manifested in the differing-by-gender temple initiatory ceremonies: males are told they need to do X, Y, and Z to receive their blessings but females are guaranteed their blessings. Second class citizens, aka female subordinates/servants to a male in the patriarchal order, get in free once they make temple covenants.
Polygamy is also still very much at play in the wording of a live temple marriage/sealing. The female gives herself to the male but the male only “receives” her. He doesn’t give himself to his wife.
The whole theology would need to change to relieve it of inequality and/or polygamy.
Our leaders, though sustained as prophets, seers, and revelators, show a great fear of those roles, preferring to label insignificant policy changes as “revelation”. And then, in GC of all places, they tell us NOT to ask, knock, or seek about our honest questions (“just trust God” and “don’t even think about praying to ask about Heavenly Mother”) and passive aggressively hold up for ridicule people who do. But what is the Parable of the Importuning Widow all about? And even more importantly, what spirit teaches someone not to pray??
Which Lord will work it out? The definitely single Essene like apocalyptic Jesus who didn’t have time to worry about marriage, the monogamist Jesus Lord with 1 wife and 9 kids who was sealed in Herods temple and does his temple work weekly, and has a perfect marriage which we are trying to strive towards – little by little, one temple endowment update after another, a model for the continuing restoration to emulate? Or the Lord who is married to both Mary and Martha?
@lws329
> The missionaries explained that if she were a man she could do that, but as a woman she would have to be married to a man and sealed in the temple to that man for her child to be sealed to her (and the step or adoptive father).
The missionaries were wrong.
>A man with the priesthood can be sealed to his child. A mother on her own cannot. A woman or child is only of value in the context of the sealing power as it is set up, if they are of value to a man holding the priesthood.
You are mistaken.
There is no way for a living single man to be sealed to children, priesthood or no. Before taking umbrage, make sure that you understand what you are taking offense at.
Mike Sanders,
First of all I want to be clear that I haven’t taken umbrage. I am a member of the church in full fellowship and I attend regularly with my family. My husband and I are sealed in the temple and are satisfied with that. So, no. I am not offended.
I do enjoy discussing the different sides of a religious problem. I like to try to understand how different people experience the church.
The story I shared was from my current ministering sister partner who experienced it. It was accurate to her experience to my knowledge. It is what she was told at that time, accurate to today’s handbook or not. It is devastating for her that she hasn’t ever had the opportunity to be sealed to her adult child. It’s also hard for her to ask that child to make a choice to reject one parent to choose another.
My friend also hasn’t taken umbrage. She was sealed in the temple to her current husband and youngest child with me as her escort last summer. She attends church regularly.
Discussing and considering how things come across to people and how we could improve is not the same as taking offense.
How would you go about checking the accuracy of what was taught to my friend? It’s true it was taught to her. Perhaps they were referring to a man whose wife had died or who had remarried a woman who met temple standards. Historically sealings have been done in a wide variety of ways, but all based on the patriarchal order, as I said. She may have misunderstood some aspects of what she was taught, but still, this is how she understands it after the missionaries taught it.
All you have is today’s handbook. It is accurate that many adult children don’t have a path for sealing to their parents until after they are dead. Then the rules do loosen up. It might help people like my friend if the rules were a little looser today.
I assert that whatever you think you know ab out life in the eternities, you know next to nothing. I cannot fathom what the need for sex is in eternities, for example. And in a place of perfect freedom, what does a top-down priesthood mean?
I think we assume that life there is like a 50 year extension of this life, TV and rocking chair included. What happens after 1000 years, 10k years, 1m years, 1g years? Huh?
Sex, on this earth, is a species survival mechanism. What is it in a place where survival is guaranteed and there are no species? Is there spiritual DNA? Do we mix them? How many mixes with one partner until we start repeating, or nearly repeating, ourselves. (Meaning, if mixing is good, maybe one partner is not enough in 1g year.)
What does patriarchy mean when it is proven that women are at least as good as men, probably better?
So I take it that a sealing is like a thankyou note: important, nice. It should be opened to all for that purpose: to show eternal love and gratitude.