Sorry if this is kind of a long post, but I want to share with you my story as a Temple Worker at the Manti Temple:

In 1997 I learned the truth about the Book of Abraham (BOA). This rocked my testimony and my whole foundation of Mormonism. I shared this with my TBM DW. At first, learning this troubling information really shook her up. Her family scared her and said that this information was just anti-Mormon propaganda and that Satan was trying to destroy her testimony. She bought into their fear-mongering and refused to look at anything not faith promoting again. I secretly continued to study the troubling aspects of Mormonism. My church activity went up and down during this time and I was really struggling spiritually.

One day in Priesthood Opening Exercises, the Bishop said there were some Temple Veil Worker positions open at the Manti Temple. I immediately raised my hand and volunteered. This was almost a knee jerk reaction on my part. My thinking was that the Temple is supposed to be the most sacred place on this earth. If the Church is really true, then working in the Temple would help me feel the Spirit. I also hoped that I would have spiritual experiences that will testify to me that the Church is true and will erase all my doubts.

The Stake President interviewed me and gave me a date to go to the Temple and start training. I showed up on a weekday evening. An elderly Temple Worker had me go into the Workers Lounge and study area. He gave me a printed and laminated copy of the Veil dialog. I had me give him my Drivers License to check it out. He gave me strict instructions to not take it out of the lounge or temple building. I had attended the Temple quite frequently, so I had the dialog at the Veil memorized, but now I had to learn the part that the Lord says and the dialog of the Veil Worker. I spent a couple of evenings memorizing my parts. I was tested and was deemed prepared to work at the Veil.

It was kind of strange how it worked. During this time, the temple had low attendance. In order to boost attendance, the Veil workers were assigned a later afternoon Endowment Session to attend. At the end of the session, the Veil workers would go first to the Veil. Once we passed through the Veil, then we would work at the Veil, either as the Lord or a Veil Worker: the one who takes the name slip, taps the mallet, and helps the patron with the Veil dialog. We would then help bring the rest of the patrons through the Veil. We would then stay after and help with the next two or three sessions, depending on the time of day.

I worked at the Temple two or three times a week, depending on my full time work schedule. Very quickly, working at the Temple became boring and unfulfilling. The old men who were the Veil Supervisors were usually cranky and I could tell that they'd rather be somewhere else. They usually rushed me and the other workers to get the patrons through the Veil quickly. I felt like I was herding sheep instead of people. I did not experience any significant spiritual experiences, even though I prayed to the Lord to please help me feel his Spirit while working at the Temple.

For about five months I kept trudging on. trying to be the best Veil Worker I could. I starting noticing that many of the names on the Name Slips the patrons gave me looked the same. One day I asked the Veil Supervisor about this. He nonchalantly said, "You're right. The Temple never has enough names for all of the ordinances done so we have to recycle them." I was pretty shaken up by his reply and asked him, "How can the Church justify this?" I also asked, "How can we say it's the work for the dead when we may be doing the same ordinances for the dead person over and over again?" He replied, "You have to understand that if we run out of names then our Temple attendance will plummet. We want to make sure that the members in our Temple District attend the Temple at least once a month." What could I say back? Really nothing. I was very emotionally shaken and I asked to leave early that night.

I went home and started researching this on the Internet. I came across this interview of Rauni Higley who was a Former Finnish Translator for the Church. http://www.salamandersociety.com/interviews/raunihigley/ She worked full time for the Church. She left after discovering troubling issues which included the Temple Ceremony. She talks about how temple names were not just recycled at every Temple, but also that the same names were simultaneously used and recycled at every Temple around the world. She also brought up other troubling aspects of the Temple ceremonies. After reading this and other things I found on the Internet, I could not honestly work at the Temple anymore. I realized the whole Temple thing is just a big scam

The Temples had to provide names of the dead so that members would believe they were doing sacred temple ordinances for only that deceased person. I remember how I would sometimes read the name and the date of birth of that departed person and think about how special it was for me to provide him these special "saving" ordinances. After learning about recycling the names, I realized that the whole work for the dead thing is a big joke. The Temples had to provide and recycle names so that members could frequently attend. To attend, they have to have Temple Recommends. And to have Temple Recommends, they have to pay a full tithe. It has nothing to do with eternal ordinances or work for the dead. It's just a way to get members to pay their goddamned tithing so the Church can buy more commercial real estate, invest in stocks, build expensive / gaudy temples; and to provide six figure salaries and thousands of dollars of perks for its General Authorities. If the members don't pay and have their temple ordinances, then they risk losing their loved ones for eternity or at least that's what the Church wants them to believe. I can't think of a crueler scam than that!

I immediately made an appointment to see my Stake President. I asked to be released and gave some bullshit excuse about my health and conflicts with work. I didn't dare bring up the disturbing things I had found out. I also was not ready to have the "apostate" label put on me yet. After all of this, I only attended the temple when my DW dragged me there or for family occasions. For sure, finding out these disturbing things about the Temple and countless other issues led to my exit out of the Church. Eight years later, I publicly came out to my family about my disbelief and I became totally inactive. Seven years later, I officially resigned from the Mormon Church. And I do not miss at all attending the Temple!

Sorry for how long this is, but I hope you find my story interesting. Feel free to ask me any questions you want.

There was a similar post to yours a few years back, about recycling the names.

People struggle to pay tithing thinking they are doing the right thing and they are just being exploited.

It makes me furious. How do those who profit sleep at night?

Not too long at all. A very valuable read for me, so thank you.

You throw an insider's much needed light on the Temple as you illustrate the scam concisely. It is all about the money. Makes me wonder if the names and dates on the slips are even real or if that church is just buying mailing lists like every other company in big business.

I imagined as I read your words all the families, like my own TBM family, who really can't afford the tithing. Paying a full tithe really impacts their lives for the worse.

So often here there is a post about whether the G.A.s really believe or if they know it is a scam. Well, they *have to know* about the phony recycling which makes the temple a joke. So they have to know its a scam. Because if they really believed God was watching them, how could they continue to issue fake names in the temple?

My 92 year old mother still goes every week and she can barely walk. Makes me sick. The first time I saw a veil over her face I was sickened and I was TBM getting my endowments then. Now all these years later with my eyes open it is even more disgusting.

It's like the end of that hilarious dialogue from George Carlin, " God loves you, and . . . He needs your money."

.....was to cull the obituaries for names to submit for temple work.

Thank you for posting this and thank you for your honesty.
"What is wanted?"
"Your tithing."

See a similar story here:

http://packham.n4m.org/temples3.htm

I also was a veil worker and can vouch for the truth of this post.

I told them I quit when they said that one of the requirements was to have extremely bad breath before my shift. They require all temple workers to have it. :)

Tammy Braithwaite and her husband were both workers at the Manti Temple and wrote of their experiences there. I believe her husband has since passed away but their book "A Mormon Odyssey" is a great source of information and takes the reader into the heart and soul of the Mormon couple who discover that the religion of their heritage is laced with a web of lies, deceit, and cover-up. They began their journeys separately, each motivated by a desire to learn the unvarnished truth about the religion they had come to embrace. They use to host ex-mo meetings in their home. Wonderful people!

Thank you OP for your story. It was fascinating. I had heard of this, but had not read anyone's first-hand account.

I wonder if this fact of the church's secretly recycling names could stand as additional evidence in a fraud lawsuit against the church. It would also be nice to see this recycling practice exposed and brought to light for the members to know about.

If all my family were exmo's I'd be tempted to publicly disclose the Church's deceitful practice of recycling temple names. Unfortunately, my DW and all of my children are still TBM's. Out of respect for them, and to keep the peace in my family, I'll not do it.

My family wouldn't listen. There is no way to prove this in a way that they can't just turn around and say "oh, that's just anti-mormon lies!"

It wouldn't matter. I'd imagine most frequent temple goers know that half the names are probably bogus or have been done a hundred times. Believing in the temple and the Book of Mormon, for that matter, in this information age is tantamount to believing in Santa Claus. There really is no excuse for those who truly believe, but they will keep believing anyway, as long as the puppet masters keep telling them it's true. The only alternative is thinking for themselves and finding the simple truth and they're incapable of that. To them, it doesn't matter if the names are bogus. God purposely wants it that way to test their faithfulness. And their being in the clubhouse is what is important to them.

The ones who find out the info and quit believing will either leave or play along to keep the peace. The ones who play along are not much of a threat to the Corp, even though they are more likely to be the ones who eventually cut themselves off completely. It's just the few who find out the truth and can't or have no reason to play along anymore who are any kind of a threat. That's where the money drain is. But the amount coming in from investments and business ventures is picking up enough that they can figure that into their future corporate projections. The temple is still the money machines, but they are good businessmen and seem to have a plan for when that stream dries up.

Thanks for sharing your story. I commend you for being a brave person about working at the temple. I felt ill every time I attended. It just wasn't a good feeling, but then I blamed myself.

Your timeline goes hand-in-hand when a lot of members were "getting on-line" and hooking up their church sponsored ancestry file program. The actual name eludes me at the moment, but my parents were thrilled about accessing the church's database from home. They were confused that all the temple work that they had carefully recorded and submitted was now showing that it had never been done! They were in shock because they had spent years squinting at microfiche at the stake's family history to record their family group sheets. Now all these relatives were missing their temple ordinance dates.

Of course, my TBM Mom made a visit the Oakland Temple to address this concern. She was determined to set them straight. Turns out that a member of the temple presidency set her straight instead. The temple work needed to done as it wasn't "officially recorded."

The temple is just a money generating scam. Nothing more.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 12/07/2018 02:41PM by messygoop.

Back in the 60 my sister took great pains to complete work for 4 generations as required by the Lord back then. We were told all you need to do is 4 generations on pegigree chart. We did all the temple work etc over next 15 years. Two weeks ago I went to family history Center and it showed very little had been done. I was shocked.

Very enlightening post!

It seems most programs in the church are all about member retention.

I remember my first day in the MTC. I attended my first conference for the new missionaries. The speaker was a general authority, I think. He asked why we were serving missions. There were a variety of answers, such as to baptize, serve Heavenly Father, etc. None of those answers were correct. The main purpose of the mission, we were told, was to strengthen the missionary. It wasn't about baptizing new members or serving Heavenly Father. It was about making us good, faithful Mormons. I didn't like that answer.

Your post points out that temple work for the dead is secondary to member retention for the living. My mission taught me that baptizing and service was secondary to keeping me active in the LDS church. Most silly church callings (I was the journal writing coordinator) are not about serving people but retaining membership by making members feel like they are doing something useful, when they're really not.

Imagine the actual good the Mormon church could do if they put their efforts into actual service. Imagine all the wasted hours members spend in temple sessions and on missions, when they could do actual service, like running a kitchen to feed the homeless, a woman's shelter where abused women could take refuge, a reading program for underprivileged children, etc. Instead members waste their time doing sessions for dead people who have already had their imaginary work done.

I served a Mission in the Dominican Republic (79 - 81). I witnessed so much abject poverty, hunger, disease, death, etc. which is so common in third world countries. When they announced about the Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic Temple I had mixed emotions. The Temple was announced in 1993, I was TBM at the time. When I found out that the Temple would be 67,000 sq ft, I knew this would be an expensive and gaudy building. I thought about all of the repetitious visits the members in that temple district would make doing work for the dead. I remembered all of the poverty and suffering that I saw and it made me wonder about the priorities of the Church. All that money spent building and maintaining the Temple and thousands of hours doing the same ordinances, over and over again for dead people. Couldn't that money and volunteer time be better used building schools, hospitals, medical clinics, food banks, etc? Now that I know about the scam of temple work it makes me angry every time I see another Temple built, especially in underdeveloped countries.

I just wanted to make sure that you knew that I read your post and I found it very informative. It is a very important post.

Thank you!

My nevermo great-grandmother had her temple work done on three separate occasions. I guess the first two didn't take. :/

Personally, I think that temple-goers should be limited to doing work for their own families. I can't see how it would be very meaningful otherwise.

Yes, it was a very interesting story - thank you - (not just) about recycling names (but how you found out); at least it's Environmental.

One is just a number, mark, or MMM (money making machine) in Mormonism. It's such a shame it's such a sham.

M@t

So, did you meet Temple worker Vern Roundy, former basketball coach from South Sevier HS who was a worker there? Had an affair with his HS Senior secretary while coach, when she graduated he divorced his wife and married her. About your timing I think he was a worker in Manti - saw him playing Peter and nearly walked out.

I don't remember him. I worked at the Temple in 2000.

From Heartbroken's post:

"Most silly church callings...are not about serving people but retaining membership by making members feel like they are doing something useful, when they're really not. Imagine the actual good the Mormon church could do if they put their efforts into actual service."

Agreed!

Before joining the church I volunteerd at an animal shelter. My calling was to babysit overweight 8-year-olds. I felt it was a total waste of my time.

The two hours helping the animals was a material impact on their lives for the better. Babysitting well-fed Mormon girl was by contrast, stupid and a waste of time.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/08/2018 12:42PM by mel.

Thank you Namarod for sharing.

I never did the whole Temple thing because I felt as a lifelong non-church-member, I was doing well to come to church at all much less do anything else.

Your story certainly confirms my decision!

Thanks.

Also, when I get old I want to enjoy my retirement, not waste my time in some stupid calling hoping it means I will get into a higher level in the Celestial Kingdom.

I agree, Mel. One day of delivering food via the Meals on Wheels program was far more fulfilling and useful than hundreds of hours of knocking doors when I was a missionary, and definitely more worth while than sitting on my ass for hours in the temple.

Thanks for your insights, Namarod.

I wonder if we ever crossed paths.

I live in the southeast. In 1988, my husband and I literally saved pennies so we could celebrate our third wedding anniversary in the Salt Lake Temple. It was a 2000 mile drive, one way. We couldn't afford motel rooms - we slept in the car, at interstate rest stops and Wal-Mart parking lots in order to afford the trip at all.

For that sacrifice, we could only get to do an endowment ceremony while at the Salt Lake temple, not the sealing session we had hoped to do.

The next day, we went to the Manti Temple. We LOVED the Manti Temple!

While driving up there, three was a dairy farm where you could go in, choose what you wanted, then put your money into a common, ordinary cigar box. No sales clerk or employee or camera around. They operated on trust. We gladly paid for our purchases (even made proper change for ourselves out of that open cigar box). What a wonderful feeling, to know the store proprietor trusted us to do right. We also signed the store's registry. People from all over the country signed that registry.

But anyway, we were at the Manti Temple for just one endowment session in late April of 1988. I don't remember the exact date. Just that it would have been a weekday.

Any chance you helped me or my husband through the veil?

Southern Exmo Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Thanks for your insights, Namarod.
>
> I wonder if we ever crossed paths.
>
> I live in the southeast. In 1988, my husband and I
> literally saved pennies so we could celebrate our
> third wedding anniversary in the Salt Lake Temple.
> It was a 2000 mile drive, one way. We couldn't
> afford motel rooms - we slept in the car, at
> interstate rest stops and Wal-Mart parking lots
> in order to afford the trip at all.
>
> For that sacrifice, we could only get to do an
> endowment ceremony while at the Salt Lake temple,
> not the sealing session we had hoped to do.
>
> The next day, we went to the Manti Temple. We
> LOVED the Manti Temple!
>
> While driving up there, three was a dairy farm
> where you could go in, choose what you wanted,
> then put your money into a common, ordinary cigar
> box. No sales clerk or employee or camera around.
> They operated on trust. We gladly paid for our
> purchases (even made proper change for ourselves
> out of that open cigar box). What a wonderful
> feeling, to know the store proprietor trusted us
> to do right. We also signed the store's registry.
> People from all over the country signed that
> registry.
>
> But anyway, we were at the Manti Temple for just
> one endowment session in late April of 1988. I
> don't remember the exact date. Just that it would
> have been a weekday.
>
> Any chance you helped me or my husband through the
> veil?

Sorry, but I was living in Germany in 1988. I worked in the Manti Temple in 2000.