New rule...LDS bishops, etc can't perform any marriages between non-member couples. At least one of them must be a mormon.

Why? I don't get it. Actually, I never knew any non-members who would ASK a mormon bishop to marry them.

This link might have a paywall.



https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2021/06/30/latter-day-saint-leaders/

Seems like a redundant rule, but that's the way with the Corp. Rules for sake of having rules...

Redundant how? They could officiate in non-member weddings before this announcement. Did that contradict some existing rule?

My Catholic wife and I were married by my old bishop who had been released from his calling but whose provincial license to perform marriages was good till the end of that year.

Not only must one participant be a member, they must be from the ward or stake of the official preforming the marriage.

Oh, and the directive specifies that the couple must be a man and a woman.

I’m not sure of the motivation, but I know in some of the rural/poor towns I have been in that had LDS chapels, the chapel was the nicest building in town. This was true in Brazil, and I have seen chapels in places like Wolf Point, Montana, where that was the case. I can see where getting married in that building might be a status symbol even for non-Mormons in the area.

Maybe LDS Inc is trying to leverage that popularity. Wanna get married here? Then you have to join.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/01/2021 12:28PM by Brother Of Jerry.

Another mormon theme....we only serve the members of our church, not the community....and we don't always serve the members of our church either!

When my nevermo daughter married my inactive son-in-law, the bishop of their neighborhood ward performed the ceremony tho son in law had never attended there.

We were married in a reception center by my hubbys’ best friends’ dad who was a pastor; he didn’t care that we weren’t members.

Strange new rule. You'd think TSCC would encourage non-members to be married by a bishop. In that setting, he has two people, *and* their (presumably non-mormon) families, to attempt assimilation. Two sets of people he can harangue about temple marriage being the only true way to happiness, and try to shame/guilt them into conversion. You don't get that kind of captive audience very often.

The Unitarian Church in SLC is a popular marriage venue, because it looks like a late 19th century New England church. No membership requirement, but there is a charge for the building, and for the minister. I don’t know if members get a break on the costs.

Various other organizations rent the building as well. I know there are at least two AA meetings there, a monthly acoustic music night, Humanists of Utah meets there, and internal church committees. The committees get to meet free of charge.

In other words, it tries to be part of the larger community. What a concept. LDS Inc tries to make sure no icky people ever get into their building.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/01/2021 02:03PM by Brother Of Jerry.

All the better for me as I am an ordained minister of the Universal Life Church so I will happily take up the slack

So am I.

Slack is where its at!

Think of Bob Dobbs

The Pharisees just can't stop pharisee-ing.

In order to "Matter", to have gravitas, there have to be visible consequences, so that fear and trembling can be imagined on the part of those experiencing the consequences.

And so you need Rules!

But in Mormonism, Rules are as malleable as the doctrine. So there will come the time when a bishop and a stake president will find it to their advantage to ignore this new rule, and so it shall be.

This new policy represents a change for the church. I wonder what prompted the change?

I'm going to add "civil wedding" to the list of words and phrases that the LDS use in odd or novel ways. Here are some common definitions for "civil wedding" from around the web:

a) "A civil marriage is one where the marriage ceremony has a government or civil official performing the ceremony rather than a religious leader."

b) "A civil ceremony is simply a nonreligious, legal marriage ceremony presided over by a legal official instead of a religious one."

c) (Great Britain) "What Is a Civil Wedding Ceremony in the UK? A civil ceremony is a marriage without any religious context, performed by a registrar."

To me, it's interesting that the LDS interpret a civil wedding as being a non-temple wedding performed by a sustained bishop, normally in a ward building. I think anyone else would regard this as a religious wedding.

Maybe some bishops had a side hustle going where they were renting out the chapel and pocketing the money. I could see that happening, especially outside the US, where the unwritten rules are not as well internalized.

My husband and I got married in time then! We were married in March last year. Covid had recently hit and the office of the Justice of the Peace was closed. We had been able to get a license but needed to find someone to marry us.

My husband's cousin was a mormon bishop and he agreed.

I'll be forever grateful to that bishop, for being willing to marry two exmormons.

Oh the irony; it caused much merriment amongst both our mo and never-mo friends and family :)

YAY, Merriment!

Mazel tov, you two crazy kids!

elderolddog Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> YAY, Merriment!
>
> Mazel tov, you two crazy kids!



Thank you elderolddog! :)

My guess as to why the new policy exists is that the church is thinking ahead and closing off all potential embarrassments and conflicts that could put them in to a bad situation legally.

If at least one of the couple is a member, the church has more control over the situation. If necessary, the church can quickly excommunicate the member and refuse to perform the marriage based on policy where otherwise, discrimination claims might prevail.

Imagine a gay couple in the famous wedding cake scenario. Except instead of buying the cake decorated with a same sex couple on it, what the gay couple is expecting the mormon bishop to do is to perform their wedding. If neither of them are church members, claims of discrimination might be easy to prove when the Bishop refuses to perform the wedding. But if one of them is a church member, then the Bishop can try to talk them out of it. If that doesn't work, then the member is excommunicated for apostasy. At that point, the church follows its policy objectively (without discrimination, even though they actually did discriminate). By policy, the Bishop can't merry two non-members.

Any and all churches can marry or refuse to marry anyone they choose. They never have been nor will they be liable to a charge of discrimination. Churches and bakeries are not held to the same legal standard. Not even close.

Wow! Married in a bakery!! Yum!

The Church of Saint Choux. Sainthood was granted after a bowl of powdered sugar was knocked off the counter, and the ensuing fallout was deemed white and delightsome.

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>> Any and all churches can marry or refuse to marry anyone they choose. They never have been nor will they be liable to a charge of discrimination.

We know that, and any rational person knows that. But the church leadership may be in a mode of thinking where they don't want to take any chances.

I wonder what mormon judges who are also bishops do?

Heartless Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I wonder what mormon judges who are also bishops
> do?

I was going to ask the same thing. My Dad was never a bishop, but he was in the bishopric many times. He was also a Justice of the Peace. I was wondering how it would be if he was a bishop.

My guess is the church views it as a wall between the two roles. A bishop/judge could perform same sex or non-member weddings in his role as a judge as long as it was outside of any church facility and not represented to be endorsed by the church. But if he wanted to do it in his role as a bishop, then he'd have to follow those rules.