Mormons and eternal marriage

[Pjs2ejs]

One of the big deals in Mormonism is to be sealed for eternity and then be reunited again in the afterlife as husband and wife. Doesn’t Jesus say in Matthew that none will be married in heaven?

Maybe I am interpreting this wrong but Matthew 22:29-30 says:

29Jesus replied, "You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God. 30At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven.

Just a thought

 

[talter]

Good point however Mormon’s would say what’s your point? If it said

Jesus replied, "You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God. 30At the resurrection people will neither (be) marr-]y/-](ied) nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven.

Then you would have a point they would have to listen to. My question for them is always if you’re sealed for all eternity together what happens if your spouse belongs in the telestial kingdom while you belong in the celestial kingdom or vice versa. And where do the kids go once they are married and sealed to their spouses? Aren’t the families supposed to be forever, or is everyone just ultimately sealed to Adam and Eve so the whole eternal marriage thing is for naught? That usually gets their mind turning. In my experience it results in a divide by 0 look on their face, they go into an immediate personal testimony or they label you as an “anti” looking to pick a fight which for me is not the issue. I love mormons (my wife in particular) just interested in getting a real dialouge going which always seems so hard.

 

[PaulDupre]

With family members stratified into different kingdoms, with visiting privileges only top-down and not bottom-up, Mormon families are not forever at all. Those who do not perform perfectly to LDS standards are left in some lower kingdom wondering when their celestial relatives are going to visit, if ever.

And it’s even worse than that. If you don’t make it to the highest level of the Celestial Kingdom but your wife does, she’ll be taken from you and sealed to another more “worthy” man becoming one of his plural wives to make spirit-babies with him for eternity, while you are out of the picture, or at best a servant to her new husband. How does that sound?

Christianity gives you much better odds of being with your loved ones throughout eternity, since there is only one heaven.

God love you,
Paul

 

[talter]

Paul,

obviously I’m newish here (this i think is my 5th post) and you have been here a while (1700+ posts). I’m guessing you’ve come out of mormonism. Did you have those observations before or after you left the LDS? Had anybody posited those points to you while you were mormon?

Sorry if I’m prying ignore if I am.

 

[PaulDupre]

Paul,

obviously I’m newish here (this i think is my 5th post) and you have been here a while (1700+ posts). I’m guessing you’ve come out of Mormonism. Did you have those observations before or after you left the LDS? Had anybody posited those points to you while you were Mormon?

Sorry if I’m prying ignore if I am.

Yes I came out of Mormonism. I converted to LDS when I was 21 years old, after only 6 weeks of investigation. That was 1975. I knew almost nothing about Mormonism at the time and it was almost entirely an emotional decision.

I went to BYU for a while, then served a mission in Taiwan from 1977 to 1979. Married in the temple, and held many Church callings. I realized fairly early on that Mormonism was a scam, but it still took me many years to extricate myself from the church. In 1986, after 11 years, I had my name taken off the records, which was not easy to do back then.

To answer your question, I had come to most of these realizations before I left in 1986. I began to see that the Mormon teachings on the nature of God were problematic when I started studying the bible in earnest while on my mission. A few years later, I could finally articulate the issue: if Heavenly Father is a resurrected human being, just like me but only further along the trail of eternal progression, then he’s not God in any way that could be meaningful to me. When I really studied the Book of Mormon, it became clear to me that there was something seriously wrong when I learned there was absolutely no archaeological trace of the highly industrialized Nephite culture. Since leaving, I have learned much more about Mormon history and the sources of LDS doctrine. The internet is very helpful in that regard. Everything I learn proves further that Mormonism is false.

I came back to the Catholic Church in 2000.

Thanks for asking,
Paul

 

[rmcmullan]

Baptism is an ordinace which must be performed in this life. Likewise marriage.

Sheesh, PaulDupre, you ought to know that.

 

[Chris-WA]

Baptism is an ordinace which must be performed in this life. Likewise marriage.

Sheesh, PaulDupre, you ought to know that.

Remember that those who were questioning Jesus about marriage were speaking hypothetically of someone who was married in *this life *to more than one husband, and wanted to know who’s wife she would be in heaven. Jesus replied that they didn’t understand the scriptures because there is no marriage in heaven. They weren’t asking Jesus if she would get married again in heaven. They were asking her which man would be her husband in heaven from a marriage that was performed on earth. Jesus understood the rediculousness of the question and explained that there is no marriage in heaven, period. Based on their question, there is no way that Jesus’ answer could be construed to mean that marriages performed on earth continue in heaven. If there was a continuation of marriage, Jesus would have said either (1) which husband she would be married to in heaven, or (2) that eternal marriage does not yet exist, but will in the future.

 

[Pug]

Since people are asking about Mormon sealing and saying it can’t be done except on this earth, is it not so that Mormons here on earth can go to the temple and have an ordinance done on them but it is really being done for a Mormon who has already died? IF I have heard this correctly, then even though a couple who is already dead didn’t get sealed, they can get sealed by some people on earth doing it in their place.

I assume this is only done for a Mormon who is in the celestial location. Also, I don’t know what additional requirements there might be for them to be eligible for an ordinance by proxy.

 

[PaulDupre]

Baptism is an ordinace which must be performed in this life. Likewise marriage.

Sheesh, PaulDupre, you ought to know that.

Yes, I know that Mormons believe that these sealings will be done on earth during the millenium. You knew that, right?

To whom are you responding? I did not respond to the question about marrying and giving in marriage. I responded to the part about eternal families as a selling point of Mormonism.

Paul

 

[truthsilence]

Baptism is an ordinace which must be performed in this life. Likewise marriage.

Sheesh, PaulDupre, you ought to know that.

So, rmcmullan, if I were to die a faithful LDS woman with a spouse who rejected Mormonism, or perhaps no spouse at all, how will the people doing the temple work for me “in this life” possibly know who the heck to seal me to? Do they just pick a name or what?

Looking beyond the surface of these unique doctrines of Mormonism, they never make any sense.

 

[truthsilence]

Yes, I know that Mormons believe that these sealings will be done on earth during the millenium. You knew that, right?
Paul

Oh, I see. So I’ll get to come back and tell them the name of my chosen spouse.

I know. God will work it all out, right? Why not let him do that in the first place.

I think I’ll rather go to the heaven where we’re all one big family. I don’t need my own world to populate. I’d like to get to know some more of the people God has already created. I think he’s got that ground covered.

 

[rmcmullan]

To whom are you responding? I did not respond to the question about marrying and giving in marriage. I responded to the part about eternal families as a selling point of Mormonism.

Paul

Ooops, yes you’re right, you are not under any obligation to explain the teaching. You were responding to the eventual fate of families with “backsliders”, which is probably most families. Sorry, I did read too fast and got identitites mixed up.

 

[rmcmullan]

So, rmcmullan, if I were to die a faithful Christian woman with a spouse who rejected Christ, or perhaps no spouse at all, how will the people doing the temple work for me “in this life” possibly know who the heck to seal me to? Do they just pick a name or what?

Looking beyond the surface of these unique doctrines of Mormonism, they never make any sense.

That’s a good question and there’s a lot of other good questions having to do with the fickleness of the human heart with regard to their duty to God and loyalty to their spouse. The teaching on eternal marriage only seems to cover the ideal case: where both the man and the woman are faithful in their duty to God. A lot of the other combinations aren’t covered or are yet to be revealed.

 

[rmcmullan]

Chris-WA I do like the argument you’re making, you’re studying the scriptures and sticking pretty close to the original text. I’ve tried to find some sort of authoratative interpretation of that scripture from an LDS prespective and the best I’ve found is at cumorah.com/etexts/jesusthechrist.txt. It’s an entire book in a single web page so do a search on the phrase “SADDUCEES QUESTION ABOUT THE RESURRECTION”.

Although James E. Talmage wrote this book (Jesus the Christ) back in 1915, it’s still published today and is well regarded.

 

[majick275]

That’s a good question and there’s a lot of other good questions having to do with the fickleness of the human heart with regard to their duty to God and loyalty to their spouse. The teaching on eternal marriage only seems to cover the ideal case: where both the man and the woman are faithful in their duty to God. A lot of the other combinations aren’t covered or are yet to be revealed.

actually LDS leaders have spoken on situations other than the ideal. Those men who are unworthy of the celestial kingdom but whose spouse are will have their spouses given to a worthy man. those women who are worthy of the celestial kingdom but through no fault of their own were unable to obtain a husband will be given to a worthy man. children who died without sin or were worthy but to young to be married will be given an opportunity to be married during the millenium. (thus skirting the “no marriage in heaven” teaching) there will also be two degrees of people in the celestial kingdom who aren’t fully exalted and thus will not be married. they will be servants to the exalted ones. Brigham Young taught that worthy black people would be in that category. this leaves us with a very few men who are exalted with many women for them to be sealed to and other almost exalted men as their court eunuchs serving them. meanwhile the rest of us will either be in the terrestrial kingdom being visited by jesus or the telestial being visited by the Holy Ghost. (and of course any celestial relatives who have time and desire to drop by) of course even in the celestial exalted ranks there will be significant change sin the family order since even children who are sealed to parents in families where all make it to exaltation will be literal siblings in the afterlife with their own kingdoms being subject to Elohim rather than living in a family situation like they did on earth as parent and child.

 

[truthsilence]

Quote:
Originally Posted by truthsilence View Post
So, rmcmullan, if I were to die a faithful Christian woman with a spouse who rejected Christ, or perhaps no spouse at all, how will the people doing the temple work for me “in this life” possibly know who the heck to seal me to? Do they just pick a name or what?

Looking beyond the surface of these unique doctrines of Mormonism, they never make any sense.

rmcmullan, Please don’t change my posts that way again. Thank you.

Rejecting Mormonism is not rejecting Christ. And to change my wording the way you did is absurd. There are no other Christian religions performing temple ordinances for the dead.

majick275 has answered your reply. Thanks majick.

 

[PaulDupre]

I think I’ll rather go to the heaven where we’re all one big family. I don’t need my own world to populate. I’d like to get to know some more of the people God has already created. I think he’s got that ground covered.

That’s a great point!

Paul

 

[rmcmullan]

As to the seperation issue: the tales of Lazarus and the rich man tells us there’s a great gap between heaven and perdition that can’t be crossed. So I wouldn’t expect that even Catholics would expect the people from heaven to co-mingle with the people in perdition. So, the problem of a good woman married to a two-timing man, (considering adultery is a mortal sin) would lead to their eternal separation even if she put up with it in her earthly life. Catholics believe all will be rewarded the same (or punished the same) instead of different degrees of glory, but even you believe there will be a separation.

The other issue is whether or not people remain married in heaven. We agree they aren’t married in the after life. Again it comes down to the family issue. If you don’t seal the parents to the children and the spouses then do you believe that all family and marriage relationships are dissolved in heaven? Sorry, I just can’t believe it. And I mean from the gut (or heart). I just can’t.

 

[lukewarm]

And it’s even worse than that. If you don’t make it to the highest level of the Celestial Kingdom but your wife does, she’ll be taken from you and sealed to another more “worthy” man becoming one of his plural wives to make spirit-babies with him for eternity, while you are out of the picture, or at best a servant to her new husband. How does that sound?

WOW cuckolded for eternity, sounds awesome…

Maybe you can give both of them foot massages and do thier dishes…

 

[truthsilence]

As to the seperation issue: the tales of Lazarus and the rich man tells us there’s a great gap between heaven and perdition that can’t be crossed. So I wouldn’t expect that even Catholics would expect the people from heaven to co-mingle with the people in perdition. So, the problem of a good woman married to a two-timing man, (considering adultery is a mortal sin) would lead to their eternal separation even if she put up with it in her earthly life. Catholics believe all will be rewarded the same (or punished the same) instead of different degrees of glory, but even you believe there will be a separation.

The other issue is whether or not people remain married in heaven. We agree they aren’t married in the after life. Again it comes down to the family issue. If you don’t seal the parents to the children and the spouses then do you believe that all family and marriage relationships are dissolved in heaven? Sorry, I just can’t believe it. And I mean from the gut (or heart). I just can’t.

This is where we really need to trust that God is greater than anything we experience here on this earth. I believe we will still know and love the people we know and love here. I believe we will all be One with God. I don’t think there will be segmented families, whether they were separated or otherwise screwed up (or not) here in this life. We will all be One “family” there. As far as who will be in heaven and who will choose separation from God, is ultimately up to God to know. I trust him to take of things.