I found the book online, what a bunch of BS. http://lds.org/relief-society/daughters-in-my-kingdom?lang=eng

Here's my favorite section.

Defending the Practice of Plural Marriage

In the early days of the Church, the practice of plural marriage was revealed to Joseph Smith. Although this practice was initially difficult for many to accept, the faithful Saints knew that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. They followed the Lord’s will as it was revealed to their prophet. They made covenants with God and were strong and devout in keeping those covenants.

When the Relief Society was reestablished in the late 1860s, plural marriage was still part of Church members’ lives. However, many people in the United States believed that women who lived the law of plural marriage were degraded and abused. As a result of a general misunderstanding about the Latter-day Saints and their beliefs, the national government passed legislation forbidding polygamous marriages.

A group of Latter-day Saint women gathered in Salt Lake City in January 1870 in response to this legislation. In the presence of newspaper reporters from across the United States, these women expressed their support for living prophets and for the practices of the Church. They defended them- selves and their husbands and proclaimed their faith and their covenants. Sister Eliza R. Snow said: “It was high time [to] rise up in the dignity of our calling and speak for ourselves. . . . The world does not know us, and truth and justice to our brethren and to ourselves demands us to speak. . . . We are not inferior to the ladies of the world, and we do not want to appear so.”

One Latter-day Saint woman expressed the feelings of many others when she said: “There is no spot on this wide earth where kindness and affection are more bestowed upon woman, and her rights so sacredly defended as in Utah. We are here to express our love for each other, and to exhibit to the world our devotion to God our Heavenly Father; and to show our willingness to comply with the requirements of the Gospel; and the law of Celestial Marriage is one of its requirements that we are resolved to honor, teach, and practise, which may God grant us strength to do.”

Newspaper reporters said this was a “remarkable meeting.” One reporter wrote, “In logic and in rhetoric the so-called degraded ladies of Mormondom are quite equal to the . . . women of the East.” During the next few months, many more women participated in such meetings throughout the territory.

In 1890, President Wilford Woodruff, the fourth Presi- dent of the Church, received a revelation that led to the Church’s discontinuance of the practice of plural mar- riage. He wrote this revelation in a document known as the Manifesto. About writing the Manifesto, he said:

“The God of heaven commanded me to do what I did do; and when the hour came that I was commanded to do that, it was all clear to me. I went before the Lord, and I wrote what the Lord told me to write.”

Because the people had accepted the pro- phetic counsel to enter into plural marriages and had made and kept their covenants, this new revelation was once again difficult for many, but faithful Latter-day Saints determined again to follow the prophet. On the day that the general membership of the Church heard the Manifesto and approved it, Sister Zina D. H.Young, who was serving as the third Relief Society general president at the time, said,
“Today the hearts of all were tried but looked to God and submitted.”

The women of the Church who, by revelation, embraced plural marriage and who, by revela- tion, later accepted the Manifesto are worthy of admiration and appreciation. They were strictly obedient to their covenants and the counsel of the living prophet. Today these women are honored by their faithful posterity.

Helen Mar Whitney, who lived the law of plural marriage, wrote, “We may read the history of martyrs and mighty conquerors, and of many great and good men and women, but that of the noble women and fair daughters of Zion, whose faith in the promises of Israel’s God enabled them to triumph over self and obey His higher law, and assist His servants to establish it upon the earth, . . . I feel sure there was kept by the angels an account of their works which will yet be found in the records of eternity, written in letters of gold.”

Excellent Article that nails this subject:

http://www.i4m.com/think/polygamy/polygamy_illegal.htm

So much the book and its faulty position.

There is no defence for practicing plural marriage.

It pactice has always been illegal: Illinois, Utah Territories, Utah as a state, and by the US Federal Government.

That quoted section is a great tribute to mindless submission to authority. It's like a flock of sheep bleating in unison: "baa-aah, the pasture on the right is the only righteous pasture...baa-aah...bad sheep go left, good sheep go right, bad sheep go left, good sheep go right..."

Then the owner of the flock remembers that he sold that pasture to his neighbor last week, so he has to send the sheep to the pasture on the left.

The sheep dogs do their thing at his command and the flock starts moving left instead of right, bleating in unison: "baa-aah, the pasture on the left is the only good pasture...baa-aaah...bad sheep go right, good sheep go left, bad sheep go right, good sheep go left...baa.aah...."

Once again, the mormon flock shows that the ultimate act of righteousness in Mormonism is to surrender all control of your thoughts and life over to the authority figures and that will be counted to you as righteousness.

Helen Mar Whitney should be the poster girl for the brain damage inflicted by polygamy. She was one of its greatest victims and here she is defending. Completely understandable, of course. She lost so much to it. but managed to endure in the belief that her sacrifice would somehow be worth it in the end. In the end, all it left her was the notion that if she continued to unconditionally obey those funky self-important men who called themselves "General Authorities" then somewhere there would be angels giving her good marks for obedience--and, hey, that counts for something. I totally understand her. Sometimes denial is all you have left. If you accept the full awareness of the enormities that have been inflicted on you, suicidal despair may be all you get for it.

On a side note, Helen Mar Whitney and the actual father of her children had to raise their family in the "knowledge" that "momma is going to be Joseph Smith's wife in the next life." Did that mean her kids would belong to Joe? I dunno.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helen_Mar_Kimball#Marriage_to_Horace_Whitney

Marriage to Horace WhitneyWith the death of Smith in 1844, and by age sixteen, Kimball had formed a relationship with twenty-two-year-old Horace Whitney. After a period of courtship, the two decided to be “married for time” on February 3, 1846 (Compton 1997, pp. 503–504). Shortly before the exodus from Nauvoo, in the Nauvoo Temple, Kimball was married to Whitney for time and again sealed to Joseph Smith, Jr. (deceased) for eternity, with her husband Whitney standing in as proxy for Smith. The following day, Whitney was sealed to Elizabeth Sykes (deceased) for eternity, with Kimball standing in as proxy for Sykes (Brodie 1971, pp. 479–480;Compton 1997, p. 486).

Kimball bore eleven children with Horace Whitney (Brodie 1971, pp. 479–480). Her son Orson F. Whitney became an apostle in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.


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I like how they didn't breathe a word about the clearly-documented polyandry that happened back then. The thought of my mother having to read this crap makes me cringe.

Baaaa. Baaaaa.


~VOW