My sister is a recent widow. She is in her fifties. The bishop called her to be a temple worker claiming she would be required to serve two five-hour stints a month. When she went to see the temple pres., he said no...we want you EVERY Friday night for five hours, and EVERY Saturday for five hours. AND if you can't make it, you need to find your own substitute.

She is not retired. She recently obtained her Psy D degree (PhD equivalent) and She's busy setting up her private psych practice. Her husband was killed in March. This is sooo not inspired! She is in tears about it.

What is so sad about this is that she feels she doesn't have a choice. If only she would just tell them NO.

I'm pretty sure she will say no, or insist on a compromise. She simply can not do this and stay sane. She has an 18 year old son who is struggling with drugs and stuff too.

If she serves in the temple, she will be blessed and her son will quit drugs. I know these things in the name of jesus christ amen.

Yes, if she is a true believer, then she must know these things to be true.

Wow, poor lady. I really am sorry for all she is going through right now. You would think the bp would know she had more pressing issues to deal with right now. Inspired callings? Yeah, right!

Every weekend, for someone who works at a real job, plus the 3-hour+ wipeout of Sunday.

Funny how they say the callings are a choice and on a volunteer basis. Yet she is "required" to put in a set number of hours.

The bishop of the ward I attended always said when extending a calling that we had a choice about whether to accept or not but his final word of advice was "Go home and pray about. The answer will be yes."

I too hope your sister can find a way to say no. She needs the time to recover from the work week and to attend to family matters.

There is also the issue of her recent widowhood. She must still be grieving. It sounds like it was a sudden loss, which would be even more devastating. This takes time to come to grips with. The last thing she needs is pressure and more expectations piled on her.

I hope she will accept your perspective on this, that it's too much to ask of her, and that callings are not necessarily all that inspired, more like desperation by the leaders to find someone to fill a gap. I also wince at the part about her having to find her own replacement if she can't make it. Just keep piling on the pressure, responsibility, and time-robbing tasks, you leaders. It might open up the eyes of even some very-TBM folks. Inspired? I don't think so.

That is outrageous! >:-(

That's insane...she needs to focus on herself and her son. I can see an easy calling to get her out of the house and get some positive social contact, but this is too much. Just too much stress.

well yeah, but: I don't think being a temple wrkr is 'social contact' time.

Certain items show how F'd up ChurchCo is, this goes to the head of the line.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/13/2011 03:20PM by guynoirprivateeye.

and i can hear them now....blessing will come to you and your son if you follow your calling

if she doesnt follow it then any furture problems with son will be her fault because she is not following the will of God

She can do what the rest of the people up to this point have done: say NO! She is most likely not the first person they have asked for this kind of commitment!

Sounds like the old "desperation" calling.
They can't get anyone to do any of it, so they lumped it all into one calling.


I hope she can control her own life, and if she wants to serve a certain amount of time, to set her own schedule, or turn it all down.

"She is not retired. She recently obtained her Psy D degree (PhD equivalent) and She's busy setting up her private psych practice. Her husband was killed in March. This is sooo not inspired! She is in tears about it."

Interesting that the career path she has chosen does not ehlp her to see the psych issues in her own life.

Boy, isn't that true of a lot of therapists? They are better at solving other peoples problems!

"oh, I'm sorry I must not have understood this calling correctly"

then, walk away.

Seriously. If she's trying to set up her practice AND help her son AND grieve I don't know how she's going to do this and everything else.

Can you remind her it's VOLUNTEER? Maybe ask her to pray and tell her that NO is a valid answer. I mean, when I was praying for answers I would accept NO from God, especially on callings where I felt like GOD could understand what I needed. She can get her own personal revelation.

Maybe then, if she is really going to say no - practice with her about nicely refusing this "position."

I have given an order that you are to do 10 hours per week and if you ever can't that you have to find a temple worthy substitute to fill in for you. If you don't do this then you will NOT be able to be with your husband for eternity. So its your choice. Do what I say or be screwed.

Maybe she should do this. But stop paying tithing because she can't get her business up and running. And start really resting every sunday by staying home and resting.

It won't be long until they don't want her any more.

Most psychotherapists find themselves fielding calls from clients in emergencies. People in therapy panic, get anxious, feel suicidal; good therapists, generally, have some means in place so clients can connect in an emergency.

Weekends are times, probably, when more anxiety-stricken clients try to reach therapists. And the times when 18-year-old boys who have lost fathers have opportunity to party with friends.

She has not only to market herself, but allow time to write up case notes and be available. For her to be simply 'unavailable' for two 5-hour-plus blocks (she has to drive to the temple, change, and blah blah blah, probably get roped into all sorts of other stuff) every weekend would cut into time she genuinely needs to be available.

The cult is demanding in excess of 10 hours here, when you consider commuting, changing, checking in and out. This on top of the five hours (add time commuting, dressing, managing, etc.) for each 3-hour Sunday block, and whatever auxilliary callings or meeting she has. They're asking her to take a part time job, free.

I hope she will find the place within her to follow what she knows she needs to do and say no.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/13/2011 03:16PM by Lorraine aka síóg.

Excellent points.

That's like an extra 40 hours a month if I read your post correctly. That's like having a second, full-time job one week a month. That's outrageous. Especially the nights they are asking for. She needs to be home to support her child and she needs a chance to have a social life of her own. This is NOT inspiration and she needs to tell her leaders that. Although other than my mom, I don't know many TBMs who will turn down a calling. My mom is very TBM but if they gave her an "over the top" calling like that, even she'd say no. Good luck to your sister. I hope she has the strength to do what is best for her family because Mormonism can really play mind games with you when you stand up for yourself.

A couple weeks ago when we were discussing the death of Ron Poelman, I said his first wife had saved my life. What I meant was that she had said something to me as a friend and mentor that helped me when I was feeling the pressure of an RM pressuring me. A 'good' mormon girl (young woman) I felt I had to do whatever I was commanded to do by a priesthood holder.

All she said was, 'You have options.'

What she meant, I took her to mean, was I didn't have to do whatever someone else commanded me to do. I could say no. No one really had said that to me. It was always obey the priesthood holders. Do what you're 'supposed' to do.

She has options. She can say no.

They LIED to her in order to get their way...so...

She can feel entirely FREE to...

Lie to them in order to get HER way.


Put it to her just like that. No one is required to be honest in response to lies. We all make up stories in order to keep from hurting other peoples'feelings and/or hurting ourselves. It sounds like she could have a dozen personal and/or professional excuses...and many of these are not EVEN EXCUSES at all, BUT VALID REASONS!

She has every right to assert herself! They are intimidating her! They deserve NOTHING in response from her. THEY are the ones in the wrong, not HER -- even GOD knows it.

Tell her that everyone on this board is giving her permission to be herself and do what she wants -- but then tell her she doesn't NEED ANYONE'S PERMISSION ANYWAY.

SHE OWNS HER OWN LIFE!

(I suggest that you print out all the responses to this post and give them to her as a gift from us. "Good luck, kid!".)

Tell her that the bishop and the TP are taking advantage of her because she's a widow. She needs to take some time off from callings or only do a very easy, Sunday only calling. She needs to focus on setting up her practice right now.

Maybe she could ring the bell. Oops! that is a priesthood calling.

Not just a priesthood calling. You have to be tall enough to reach it.

I agree. Someone saw the word "widow" on her record, and assumed she was some little old lady with nothing better to do. Aargh.

Some people see widows as easy pickings. My mom went through the same thing when she was first widowed at a young age. She was hurting, confused, and vulnerable, and people would try to take advantage of her.

I don't think it's unreasonable for her to say "I'm going to have to decline. With the death of my husband and the startup of my practice, it's not the right time in my life to take on such a major undertaking. I'll let you know when I'm ready to accept a calling." If they persist, she should say that she prayed about it.

I wonder if they're just flinging this calling at people to see if it will stick somewhere. They may be expecting her to say no.

Does she not know how to form her mouth to say "no?"

Anything she does for that cult that she does not really want to do is her own fault. I do not feel sorry for those people. Hopefully the anguish it causes provides a kick in the pants to help them extricate themselves.

I used to get a kick out of saying no. Usually I'd get a phone call asking me to do something and if I didn't want to do it, I'd say no. Then there'd be dead silence as the person on the other end waited for a reason or explanation. I never felt obligated to provide an excuse. So after that awkward silence, they'd say ok and hang up.

The Mormon church is using her, just like they use senior couples. They will come after her tithing money (they don't care if people can't afford tithing) and, like many old widows with just one child, the Mormon church will try to get her house signed over to them, and her son's inheritance, too, eventually. Her son should be very worried! You can't tell your sister anything, though, because she is already indoctrinated.

Talk to your sister, gently. By that, I mean LISTEN to your sister. Ask her what she feels is her mission in life--then let her tell you. As she tells you, you can repeat some of her words, to solidify things in her own mind. This will help straighten out her thinking.

This is not criticizing her religion. Actually, if you, too, are spiritual, you could bring God into it.

Your sister is a mother, first and foremost. How does this extreme devotion to the Mormon church effect her son? Will it drive a wedge between them. As one poster stated, Friday and Saturday nights are the prime times druggies get together. Will her dedicating her free time to a dead people show her living son that she cares about him?

The idea of back-door blessings is absurd! Our neighbors went on a mission, so that their children would be "blessed" by God. Instead, they could have stayed home and helped their daughter through her divorce, babysat the grandchildren, and the husband would have made sure his business partner didn't run off with all the money and bankrupt their business. The missionary wife would not have gotten an embolism in a country far away, and died shortly after.

One of your sister's goals is to start her psychology practice, right? Will this temple stuff help here there? No talking allowed in the temple. No friends or contacts made. No planning, or writing down ideas for her business, no overlapping of tasks. If a patient--or her son--calls her while she's in the temple--forget about it. Standing up for hours will sap her energy. The sour atmosphere of death will depress her. She needs to let go of death, and live her life with her son!

Not to mention, that 50 is young, and she might meet another good man--it happens! There would be no dates for your sister, because her weekends would be taken. A woman can't have a second temple marriage, anyway, so the Mormons prefer to keep her a widow, for the rest of her life.


Your sister is going through a very rough time in her life. In my own experiences, when I was the most down-trodden, that was when the Mormon church was the most abusive. A good policy with Mormons is, "Never let them see you sweat." As a woman on her own, your sister must be very careful to not become a victim.

She should not be apologetic in her tone, when she tells them "no." There's an old Swedish saying, "Never complain. Never explain." If your sister complains, the temple president will tell her a story about some widow who did her calling, who had 6 children, and two jobs, and an incurable illness. If your sister explains, every explanation will be countered with an argument, such as, "But God is commanding you to do this." or the bearing of his testimony. As your sister tells them, "No" she will find out for herself how the Mormons bully widows. It would be a good idea for you and/or her son to go with her on her interviews. She should not have to stand up to the authoritarian priesthood alone. You don't need to speak, but just be there to witness the whole thing.

My condolences to your sister. Thank goodness she and her son have you looking out for them!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/13/2011 06:15PM by forestpal.

DW was called to work in the temple with the same schedule 5 hours twice a week.

She told them no. She pointed out that she works 40 hrs a week and her car isn't reliable enough to put an extra 400 miles a week on it.

Whoever asked her to work, said "Oops, I didn't know that" and dropped it right there.

My TBM mom is furious about this ridiculous calling. I wouldn't be surprised if she took a plane to Colorado and gave that TP a piece of her mind! You go, mom!

I think my sister is more inclined to listen to my TBM mom's opinion of this rather than mine, ya know, cuz I'm the apostate.

But I can certainly point out all the practicalities of saying NO. I'll leave out the fact that I think the temple is a big waste of time and that her priesthood leaders are full of shit. I'm actually hoping that this is enough to push her and my mom out the church doors.

My mom was also saying on the phone this morning how BORRRRRING. Relief society was on Sunday, and some other things. Oh, how I wish I wasn't the only apostate in the fam! Someone, anyone, join me!

but often therapists find it easier to look outward to others and help them rather than to look inward at our own ineffective behaviors.

Your sister knows the language of setting effective limits and now is the time for her to apply that information to herself. It is fairly easy to set hypothetical limits like how you're going to be firm in the future. It's another thing to actually say "No" when it's called for. All the old fears of conflict pop up, the threat of being called selfish, or in your sister's case, disobedient.

If she allows herself to get caught in a bind like this, maybe therapy could help her to separate her own priorities from the mormon church's.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/13/2011 08:31PM by Adult of god.

Brings back memories of the confusion surrounding "inspired" callings.

The leaders are supposedly inspired to extend the calling, and then you're supposed to pray for inspiration to accept, but what if the two inspirations from the same god conflict?

So why pray about it?

Crazy mind games.