Friday, August 24, 2012

Janie as a ghost... a very angry ghost.

This one I've always, always, always struggled with and only got past it by thinking "well, maybe it will never happen to me."  And I guess I've reached a different level of maturity or frustration because that line of thought doesn't work for me anymore.

Polygamy.

Not early Polygamy of the Restored Church or Polygamy of the Old Testament. (Not that those don't sting mighty bad)  But our current practice of polygamy.  Yes it exists.

A living woman may be sealed to only one husband.

But a living man may be sealed to another if his wife dies.

And both of his marriages are considered eternal.

That is polygamy. It is not earthly polygamy but eternal or as I've seen it coined "celestial" polygamy - but therein lies the rub to me. At least with polygamy practiced here a wife may have her say in the matter - but after her death she can't.  I'm not sure how many late night discussions this has led to - I'm sure Kyle would say in the thousands. Always ending with him agreeing never to be sealed to anyone else if I die...

Because I will come back and haunt him and his new wife the likes of which no Paranormal Activity movie could dream up.

So when this is such a tender subject its hard to swallow Apostles of the Church doing this exact thing:
Like these two:


Harold B. Lee, the eleventh president of the church, also remarried after his wife 's death and was sealed to another woman and was looking forward to a polygamous relationship in heaven. He, in fact, wrote a poem in which he reflected that his second wife, Joan, would join his first wife, Fern, as his eternal wives: 

My lovely Joan was sent to me: So Joan joins Fern
That three might be, more fitted for eternity.
"O Heavenly Father, my thanks to thee"
(Deseret News 1974 Church Almanac, p. 17)

Then the flip side - what if a new bride loses her husband in some tragic way? She can not be sealed again.
What if she goes on to have another marriage and children. She will not be sealed to those children in this life.

So maybe none of this will go down without all parties involved being A-OK with it.
Maybe we will all be without any guile, jealously, or emotion in heaven and be A-OK with it.
I don't know...

but for now - I don't like it.

not. one. bit.



And again, as pertaining to the law of the priesthood—if any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another, and the first give her consent, and if he espouse the second, and they are virgins, and have vowed to no other man, then is he justified; he cannot commit adultery for they are given unto him; for he cannot commit adultery with that that belongeth unto him and to no one else.
 And if he have ten virgins given unto him by this law, he cannot commit adultery, for they belong to him, and they are given unto him; therefore is he justified.
And again, verily, verily, I say unto you, if any man have a wife, who holds the keys of this power, and he teaches unto her the law of my priesthood, as pertaining to these things, then shall she believe and administer unto him, or she shall be destroyed... Doctrine and Covenants 132
Interested read here: 


3 comments:

Erin Wales said...

This part of the church was and still is very disturbing to me and I think it is definitely linked to your last post about the churches gender issues.

Tony said...

I continue to respect and agree with the concerns you've expressed here over the past couple of weeks.

Jaime said...

My favorite professor at BYU recommended this article to me:

http://eugeneengland.org/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/1987_e_001.pdf

It makes a good case (in my opinion) for the idea that polygamy won't actually have any place in the eternal scheme of things.