Temple crisis


Sunday21
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12 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

I am intrigued by what you say about popular conceptions of romantic love--I don't have time to gather my thoughts here; but I suspect we might agree that society's obsession with it has actually led to less happiness and fulfillment and stability; at least over the past half-century or so.  

Here's the deal: Romantic love, as best I can recall, has never been taught as a principle of happiness in the Gospel. And statistically, whereas it's a bit harder to gauge happiness, stability has decidedly declined since the invention of western culture's "love" marriages.

Romantic love is a bunch of false hooey. It's nothing but hormones swimming in the brain. Sure, it's nice. And I'm a sucker for it. But anyone who's been married for a long time knows that it is not the foundation of a good marriage. Hormones fade.

True love, on the other hand, (Christ's love) IS the foundation of a good marriage. True love is about sacrifice, commitment, and consciously placing another's value above your own self-interests.

This ^ is another part of that big lie we've been discussing about homosexuality and the idea that they cannot find happiness if they don't have their romantic love needs fulfilled (as in they cannot have a legitimized sex relationship with whom they want). It's total garbage at every level. By their logic, if my wife gains weight, gets injured, loses a limb, or even just grows older, I can no longer find happiness in my relationship with her, because I am not sexually attracted to fat, disabled, arm-less, or/and old women. And we wonder why marriages are falling apart the world over. Because "passion" is, according to the big lie, the most important thing in a "marriage".

I have good (and previously faithful) people I know well who have up and left the church in support of this lie. These people are almost all faithfully married with children and have lived the truth. In one case, the husband has homosexual feelings, but has chosen to remain committed to his wife and children -- indicating that he understand the truth of it -- and yet they still leave the church in support of the idea that "passion" should rule and that those who the church, essentially, are asking to make the same choice that he has made are being assaulted with hate and bigotry. Seriously?

Well...that's about how the logic works in these things. That is to say...no logic at all.

I have no doubt that polygamy would be incredibly difficult to live. But it is not because there would be less passion. A., per the point(s) above, passion is not the primary ingredient in happiness (if an ingredient at all) and B., (and this also relates directly to the lie of homosexuality) passion can be learned/developed.

What?! You mean you can change what you're passionate about and/or who you're passionate for?

The horror! How dare I? What hate speech is this!?

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22 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

 It strikes me as an ideal marriage, but apparently for Chernow it was the wrong kind of love; and he seems at times genuinely mystified as to how Washington could possibly have found such a "passionless" relationship fulfilling.

Perhaps loyalty and devotion to wife and family can supplant romantic passion.  Such a notion is impossible to conceive in our world of abject selfishness, to those who seek the "flavor of the month", or see it as trading in the old model for the new one.

Edited by cdowis
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1 hour ago, cdowis said:

Perhaps loyalty and devotion to wife and family can supplant romantic passion.  Such a notion is impossible to conceive in our world of abject selfishness, to those who seek the "flavor of the month", or see it as trading in the old model for the new one.

What is it that keeps someone from injecting passion into the loyal, devoted relationship? Why supplant? Just add the passion.

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As I stated before, I am not in favor of Polygamy myself.  That IS a PERSONAL opinion...not doctrine. 

In regards to romantic love, that explains a LOT, and if one is a historian, they probably can understand the context.  This will go off topic, even off the off topic topic of polygamy...eventually.

Romantic love is a rather new concept for a reason to get married.  Generally it was seen as a disastrous consequence if people who were "in love" got married.  Most today see Romeo and Juliet as a tragedy...but for different reasons than they may have when it was written.  When it was written, it could rather be seen similar to Madam Bovary (Which was written much later, but is still seen by some in western society as a morality tale whereas Romeo and Juliet is normally no longer seen as such) or other morality tales, a warning of what following the dictates of emotion rather than society could lead to.  It would lead to tragic consequences.

Traditionally, LOVE was not something that factored into who one would marry, at least generally.  It was something that depended on your culture, but almost always involved your parents rather than your own choices.  Reasons could vary from prestige and social standing, to what your parents felt would lead to a good stable home with a good foundation that would help the family thrive.  Marriages that came from this romantic love notion really didn't start making a majority in any society until around 300 - 350 years ago.  Before then, it didn't matter what you felt towards your wife before you were married, what mattered was that you were loyal to her or him afterwards (especially in Christian society, where divorce was basically illegal before the reformation) and strove to raise your children correctly.  Marriage was viewed as a very DIFFERENT idea back then.

These changes in how marriage was viewed from one of societal responsibility to one where marriage occurred because of your love for someone else is probably also most likely responsible for how we view marriage now days, and why things such as Gay marriage is even seen as a possibility.  The entire reason for the existence of marriage has changed.  Traditionally, it did NOT MATTER who you loved before your marriage day, you married for your social and family responsibilities.  LOYALTY was the big thing in marriage as well as fealty to spouse and obedience to parents.

This is one of MANY things that has changed over the years.

That said, I'm terribly romantic at heart, and love the ability to marry who I love.  I find it very inspiring and sweet to see an old couple who have been so devoted and cherished by each other that they have been married since they were young, never divorced, and remain married till they are both very old and have the hope to be with each other forever.  What more romantic a view can one have!  I am not ashamed to say this heavily influences my stance on polygamy despite understanding the history and background.

Back onto how the above attitudes relate to Polygamy and the Lord.  When polygamy existed in Christianity and Judaism previously, as I stated, marriage was not a union of romance, but one of obligation and loyalty. 

The Greeks, despite what one may consider somewhat hedonistic ideals in some ways, represent this almost perfectly.  A man may select another man for romance or pleasure in some of the Greek societies, but this was seen as a unique and very different than what one did with a wife or why one even had a wife.  Wives were family, lovers were not.  When times were hard, family was what one relied on and who absolute loyalty lay upon.  Lovers, or those under the purview of romantic love had no such bounds.  The entire aspects of lust, romance, love, and marriage were different than what we have today, so much that what we talk about today in regards to romance and marriage would be foreign to a Greek or other inhabitant of the that ancient world, and what they felt marriage was would probably be foreign to MANY Of us today.

Many of the Greek tragedies actually focus on what happens in these situations when one follows emotion rather than societies' expectations.  A tragedy occurs when one follows lust, love, or another aspect rather than loyalty to family, home, king, or religion.  Their ideals championed items that would be foreign to many of us today, and their reasons for why some items ended in tragedy are much different then how many see them in our western society.  Tragedies in Greek myth and legends ALWAYS had a cause far before the tragedy ever occurred, and it was predictable at the beginning of the story or play that it was indeed going to be a tragedy due to how the characters acted in the beginning.

This is NOT just an idea that was held by the Greeks. Many ancient society held these ideals, where purely following one's emotions over the good of society or family was ever the tragic situation, whereas obedience, loyalty, family ties, and strength in one's families were qualities to be upheld.  This extended to marriage.

In that light, polygamy was NEVER about romantic love.  Ever.  It was in regards to society, expectations, loyalty, and how the culture that it is cultivated proceeds.

I bring this up because this is an aspect I think many people have problems with today.  It is not just in marriage arenas, but in MANY areas where the Bible or scriptures may talk about things that we, in our western mode of thoughts, cannot seem to agree with.  What the Lord may think on something may not correlate with how we think he should think on something.  The society and culture the Lord has is NOT our modern Western society.  It is NOT our western way of thought.  His way of thinking has existed LONG before ours, and will exist LONG after ours.  Many times we want to place constrictions and boundaries on the Lord because of how WE, in our Western and Modern though believe it should be.  This extends to things from marriage, to slavery, to marriage within the church.  Because so many want to inscribe upon the Lord in OUR image rather than make ourselves in HIS image, many try to change things to fit their world view.

The thing is, that we want to imprint western society (which is extremely new in the history of things) on the things of the Lord which expands to encompass all societies and all things.  It's a case of frustration because the Lord is not someone to bend to our will, but to whom we should bend our will to.  When we decide what the Lord has to accept and want to force him to accept, rather than what we will be humble about in following his commandments, we tend to create a society like we see being formed in some parts of the world today which flaunts hatred of Christianity and all the things that are important to the Lord.

People cannot seem to understand that the way men think is not necessarily the same as the mind of the Lord.  That the mind of the Lord may be different, and that a willingness to obey his commandments instead of our own baseless desires and ideals are things that are important.  Many of the things people find hard to obey or follow in the Scriptures is because of this difference, and their unwillingness to obey the Lord in all things.

That said...I am STILL a huge romantic.  I believe in love.  I love the ideal of romantic love.  It helps when you marry a perfect spouse.  So, yes, I know the arguments in regards to Polygamy and all the rest...

But I am STILL heavily in favor of monogamy and that one can love their spouse with sole focus of their heart, just as one can love the Lord with all their heart minds and might, they can also love their spouse (single, not plural).

In addition, I would NEVER want to lose my spouse for any reason, and I would not want her to marry some other bloke.  I would never want her to by chance be sealed to someone other than I. 

In like manner, why would I ever wish to do something like that to her.  I would not, I love her to much to want to do something like that to her.

I don't even like the idea that they are sealing multiple husbands to woman for the dead (from what I understand, it came into debate when my great grandmother which had specific instructions NEVER to seal her to her first husband and ONLY seal her to her second husband under any circumstances...was sealed to her first husband anyways...church policy these days I guess), so yes, I understand the ideas of how polygamy should work and why...but I PERSONALLY do not wish to see it ever return, at least currently.

Edited by JohnsonJones
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On 3/24/2017 at 4:39 PM, Mike said:

Do really mean that? You don't see a difference? Unless I misunderstood, you described a situation where my Mom and Dad divorce. My Dad remarries. (Does my Mom remarry?) Now Dad and his second wife are raising me? So Dad obtained custody? What about my Mom? I see a lot of difference between your scenario and polygamy. :confused:

No difference to me.  A legal paper saying they're not husband and wife anymore doesn't release any of them from their eternal and moral responsibility to raising the children they brought into this world together.  They can pretend they somehow divorced themselves from that responsibility if they want.  Nothing different than somebody who thinks they're not liable for their covenants just because they decided they're not members of the Church anymore.

Edited by anatess2
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39 minutes ago, priesthoodpower said:

@OP - I have 3 daughters and no sons. My brother has 2 daughters no sons. My sister had 4 daughters and 3 sons. Over the years I have observed many families with daughters outnumbering sons. Not sure if its a regional thing or cultural thing but females tend to be birthed more then males.

In my family, it's just the opposite.  Of our 7 children, we had 4 boys and 3 girls. Out of my 12 grandchildren we only have 3 granddaughters.  From what I have studied there typically are more male births to female births by about 105 males to 100 females.  I found the following study:

"In a scientific paper published in 2008,[20] James states that conventional assumptions have been:

  • there are equal numbers of X and Y chromosomes in mammalian sperm
  • X and Y stand equal chance of achieving conception
  • therefore equal number of male and female zygotes are formed, and that
  • therefore any variation of sex ratio at birth is due to sex selection between conception and birth.

James cautions that available scientific evidence stands against the above assumptions and conclusions. He reports that there is an excess of males at birth in almost all human populations, and the natural sex ratio at birth is usually between 1.02 and 1.08 (102/108 male to 100 female ratio). However the ratio may deviate significantly from this range for natural reasons."

Study after study seems to confirm the data that there are more males born than females worldwide even when factoring for female infanticide in certain populations. 

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On 2017-03-28 at 5:00 PM, The Folk Prophet said:

Of course the question isn't really about the ratio of boys to girls born. It's about the ratio of temple worthy, righteous boys to girls. ;)

Yes! So all you dudes, go do some endowments! Actually, the imbalance in temple work is inevitable as more women than men work part time or are at home. Consequently no matter, how many baptisms the brothers perform, we will always have an imbalance. But could the dudes, please go and do some endowments anyway? Wouldn't that be a nice way to spend part of your vacation time?

Edited by Sunday21
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Our ward/stake is doing a push to do a special session next Thursday (April 6th) :) .  Unfortunately, that falls on a Thursday.  Not good for our schedule.  We're planning on going Friday the 7th.

Next year, April 6th falls on a Friday.  How convenient.

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10 hours ago, Sunday21 said:

Yes! So all you dudes, go do some endowments! Actually, the imbalance in temple work is inevitable as more women than men work part time or are at home. Consequently no matter, how many baptisms the bothers perform, we will always have an imbalance. But could the dudes, please go and do some endowments anyway? Wouldn't that be a nice way to spend part of your vacation time?

I'm glad someone other than my wife and kids also realize that I'm a bother.  :cool:

I actually like that terminology though!

9 hours ago, Carborendum said:

Our ward/stake is doing a push to do a special session next Thursday (April 6th) :) .  Unfortunately, that falls on a Thursday.  Not good for our schedule.  We're planning on going Friday the 7th.

Next year, April 6th falls on a Friday.  How convenient.

Yes, that is an oddity we also suffer from.  We get assignments from higher up, and our ward never seems to be the lucky ones that get weekends.  We normally end up with things like Wednesday or Thursday evenings (at least it's normally the evening than during the day, there are some wards that apparently get that assignment time) which can make it difficult for many except the retired or those who have the time off to get to the temple in time to do sessions.

Edited by JohnsonJones
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Mrs. Karma and I have been remiss on our temple attendance (As an agreement between us, we attend temple together, never separate) and a visit from the bishopric (The Bish is traveling, again) dropped by the house (Not unusual as one of them is my home teacher) and brought up bringing my wife to the temple. We really have no excuse not to, the temple is about 25 miles away. 

I know that we have always been glad, feeling blessed for having gone after we're done for the evening.  We stop at Del Taco for our (Temple Tacos night) after.  I guess we've got to get to it. 

As far as a shortage of brothers, I'm sorry, I just don't attend the temple without my wife. I'm one of those brothers that thinks that if you're in a temple marriage, when you go to the temple, you bring your wife, no exceptions. I know, I'm an odd duck. Before I was sealed, I remember sitting in the temple by myself, when it came time to do some of our stuff, I never felt comfortable being solo, alas, when I met my wife, one of the things that I was very happy about is that I would never have to go to the temple solo again.

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On 3/22/2017 at 4:47 AM, Sunday21 said:

Temple crisis. Apparently we have a world wide shortage of male patrons to do ....am I allowed to say this? Not sure! The longer ceremony (you know what I mean). For men, we are backed up to 2013 world wide. Consequently, the family sealings are backed up. So if you have not made plans for your vacation this year and you are a priesthood holder, could I possibly ask you to help us out? Now that I think of this, is this a temple crisis or a family history crisis? Anyway, if you have a few days this summer or even a spare afternoon, could you possibly help us out? Promise of big party in the next life! You guys come on down and visit me! Root beer on me!

Does anyone have any ideas about what to do about this? If you are a member of another lds board, could I possibly ask you to post a message? I am however a bit concerned that a push for men, may cause the sisters to slow up a bit. Obviously we have a gender imbalance but I don't want to discourage any sisters!

i wonder, almost, well this is controversial but as we do have a labor shortage male-wise, if we could have some sort of program to encourage endowed males to go to the temple. So what do we do when we need large numbers of people to do something? I gues we investigate what is the barrier to action and try to remove that barrier. 

 

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When you are 18 called to serve the living for two years, when you are 80 called to serve the not living for five :)? I started sharing family ancestor names with the temple in 2012 and it is true that their ordinances were just completed and there are male names in my file submitted in 2013. 

Edited by lds2
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On 3/31/2017 at 10:04 PM, Bad Karma said:

As far as a shortage of brothers, I'm sorry, I just don't attend the temple without my wife. I'm one of those brothers that thinks that if you're in a temple marriage, when you go to the temple, you bring your wife, no exceptions. I know, I'm an odd duck. Before I was sealed, I remember sitting in the temple by myself, when it came time to do some of our stuff, I never felt comfortable being solo, alas, when I met my wife, one of the things that I was very happy about is that I would never have to go to the temple solo again.

The question you may want to consider is whether you only go when it is possible for her to go.  Why not go with her on your usual time, but still go an additional time when she is unavailable.  Otherwise, what may appear to be noble is merely an excuse to limit the number of times you go.

Give it some thought.

Edited by cdowis
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This thread has so many topics in it...

I believe the church has undertaken a concerted effort to become more  mainstream over the last decade in particular and would be loathe to undo any of the work done to make us seem more acceptable to the rest of society. We can assume this push towards appearing more 'normal', especially to mainstream Christians, has been sanctioned by the leaders of the church. With that in mind, we all know that the practice of polygamy is one of of a few primary criticisms leveled at us by the general public and with our shiny image of 'normal' being promoted, it seems unlikely to me that it would be re-introduced in this lifetime.

 

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46 minutes ago, Unity said:

This thread has so many topics in it...

I believe the church has undertaken a concerted effort to become more  mainstream over the last decade in particular and would be loathe to undo any of the work done to make us seem more acceptable to the rest of society. We can assume this push towards appearing more 'normal', especially to mainstream Christians, has been sanctioned by the leaders of the church. With that in mind, we all know that the practice of polygamy is one of of a few primary criticisms leveled at us by the general public and with our shiny image of 'normal' being promoted, it seems unlikely to me that it would be re-introduced in this lifetime.

 

I suppose, in my opinion that depends on what qualifies as "this lifetime". ;) As far as timing goes (in this lifetime or not), based on how quickly I've seen things change over the past few decades.... Well...my thinking is that making such a prediction is impractical at best. Not that I predict otherwise either.

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My wife and I have many young children. It is sometimes difficult to visit the temple together (well for one, it costs more to go together due to the babysitter). And when we have infants that are breastfeeding, she feels she can't go to the temple for endowments since they take too long (young infants feed every 2 hours). So I often find myself going alone. And I enjoy it. I do love going with her as well, but I'm completely fine if she goes one day during the week, and I choose a different day to go. Besides, when we're in the endowment, we're separated anyway, so we're not really together that much when we do go to the temple together. 

TLDR: please just go, you will enjoy it whether you're with your spouse or not. :)

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