Last year, I got divorced. Since then, I've been stumbling around in the lone and dreary world of middle-aged, post-Mormon dating.
It's been interesting, to say the least.

Because my profile says I went to BYU, I get responses from a lot of active Mormon women who assume that I must be active, too.
There are plenty of reasons to not date a TBM woman, but today I was thinking about one in particular:

The church will always come first.

It's one thing if a woman says her KIDS will always come first.
You kind of expect that. She's known them a lot longer than she's known me.
The church coming first, though...screw that.
The church would happily destroy ANY marriage if it suited their purposes.


Then I thought about it a little deeper.
And I came to the conclusion that endowed members can't actually get married.
Tell me if this makes sense...

Sister Virtuous is getting married in a few days, so she goes to the temple with her family to receive her endowment.
When they get to the part about the Law of Consecration, she makes the covenant to:

"consecrate YOURSELVES, your time, talents, and everything with which the Lord has blessed you, or with which he may bless you, TO THE CHURCH of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for the building up of the kingdom of God on the earth and for the establishment of Zion."

Then, on their wedding day, she is asked to take her husband by the right hand and "give YOURSELF to him to be his lawfully wedded wife."

Now, I may not have actually GRADUATED from BYU...
But, I'm smart enough to know that if you already gave yourself to the CHURCH, you can't also give yourself to your HUSBAND.
Right?
Or is there a different definition of "consecrate" that I don't know about?
Like, how "translate" doesn't actually mean "translate"?


The church will always come first™

Mormondumb is filled with vague concepts for which the church requires strict adherence.

"I'm smart enough to know that if you already gave yourself to the CHURCH, you can't also give yourself to your HUSBAND."

This is where the TBM split personality comes in handy.

The church always comes first is one of the main reasons that I stay away whenever possible.
An example: I have done a huge amount of research into the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth. I have come to the conclusion that he did kive as a human being during tha time ascribed to him. I beliee that he violated Romen law was tried and executed undet that law.
That is where empirical evidence stops. Therre is no unchallengeable evidence to support the claim that he was resusrrected. It is all hearay and based only on faith and belief not on proof.
Of course that is the major reason it is so powerful! "I totally believe" is basically an unchallengeable statement.

So, the current score is:
One vote for....."Ve vill ask ze questions!"
One vote for....."split personalities"
One vote for....."Jesus was real"

You never know where these topics are going to take you.

The paradox is resolvable if you recognize that the way the religion was established made the husband the representative of the church in the home. The man was the shepherd for his flock of plural wives and their spawn, he held the priesthood and could give blessings, and in the resurrection it was he who would bring his wives forth from the grave.

That sense of patriarchy eventually lost favor in broader society, so now people assume there is a conflict between obeying God and obeying your husband. But that is a modern problem, not one that existed in Mormonism until probably four or five decades ago.

Is anyone really married? In what sense are you talking about marriage? Mormon promises of eternity?

Death is not a relief, nor is the bottle.

Wtf?

Gallows humor is dead. Oh, well.

Baptize it and you can be together forever someday.

I've never met a mormon yet who took any of it to that degree of seriousness. Most of them are on a spectrum somewhere where they do what they can/want for the church and then do whatever they want with the rest of their life. Some including not wearing garments and drinking, etc. Most are just social mormons.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/28/2022 12:06PM by Devoted Exmo.

I have heard of bishops suggesting that members get a divorce if their spouse quits the church.
And I've heard of people who actually took that advice.

It happens all the time, both explicitly and implicitly--when a bishop or SP takes sides in a marital dispute and quietly persuades the favored spouse that the disfavored spouse is an evil influence over the marriage or the children.

Believers, especially in duress, are easily manipulable. In those circumstances the local dentist-cum-spiritual-leader can destroy a marriage or a family quite easily.

Plot twist:
Since the man also covenants to consecrate everything with which the Lord has blessed him, or with which he may bless him...

If the Lord blesses him with a wife, she gets automatically consecrated to the church, even if she isn't a member.
Same with kids.

Yes.

Elder Brother Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have heard of bishops suggesting that members
> get a divorce if their spouse quits the church.
> And I've heard of people who actually took that
> advice.

I've heard of that happening a lot. I just didn't know anyone who was that devoted to the church. Those who dumped their spouse over religion generally did it because of their devotion to their place in the afterlife over their devotion to their spouse. I'm not sure it was because they had promised their worldly goods to the church. It was a different kind of selfish calculation.

I agree. It doesn't make sense as individual covenants as if wife and kids are possessions.

gotta separate the Wheat from the tares, ya know…

that’s the unspoken 4th mission of ChurchCo

Isn't the guy from the Wheaties box a woman now?

Betcha nobody at the company saw that coming.

Do I care ?

Not unless you worked for General Mills.

What about well endowed members ?

Sure, EB, you have an accurate read of the map.
Would be like marrying an anaemic nun but half the fun. Not a formula for success.
Only good deal is you know what's coming (and what's not)

"Church" is the balderdash it spouts - ridiculous sure but not going to change it.
Greater concern is the woman who falls for such nonsense just isn't long-term relationship material.
Heck - not even short-term.

Good luck.

I wa married to the same woman 56 years and I can tell you frome experience THE CHURCH ALWAYS COMES FIRST!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Miss her much?

I think you've bemoaned your loss of companionship.

My wife is a member and church has been a big issue but not one I'd complain about her with when she was gone by divorce or death.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/28/2022 05:35PM by Elder Berry.

Funny. I thought an endowed member would not only attract one bride but enough to pop out enough babies to equal the number of the grains of sand along the sea shore. That’s a lot of jizz but with your loins being washed and blessed anything is possible.