Has anyone ever heard of anyone raising their hand when invited to at the start of the endowment ceremony to bow out? I've never heard of this as people would generally be too embarrassed to do so as they'd be put on the spot. Plus they haven't even learned what covenants they're about to make.

Or perhaps when told to bow their heads and say yes, has anyone ever said no instead? Would that technically invalidate any covenants supposedly made?

I saw someone leave at that point of the endowment in the Provo temple. He was a young guy--looked like a newly minted elder--going through for himself. His escort and a small group (maybe his family) left with him. Poor guy. That took a lot of courage on his part.

Whaddya mean, poor guy? Cool, that he had the cajones to leave!

He looked absolutely sick, and the middle-aged man with him (his dad, maybe?) looked absolutely furious. I hope they weren't too hard on him, because, as you say, it took a lot of cojones on his part to leave. He had to have been very frightened and upset.

See, Morg likes to play catch-22 in everything they do. In this case, you are damned if you leave; you are damned if you stay.

1. If you leave, that means you believe that their somehow have power over you, that their rituals somehow will determine your fate and future, and that you believe their version of "God" and buy into their "fear tricks." So, you BELIEVE all these. In such case, if you leave, you will not attain eternal happiness because you refuse to make all the covenants necessary to exaltation. So, you are damned.

2. If you don't believe their bogus but choose to stay because you feel too embarrassed to leave, then you are being untrue to youself, which in turn means you'll have to live with that for the rest of your life. So, to a lesser degree, you are damned.


grrrrrr.............

you are either just ready to leave on your mission or get married--maybe getting married that day. They discourage most people from going before one of these two events.

So--you balk. Then what? So they have you.

I wish I would have went one last time.

I could have gotten up and left. When they chased me down (somehow i'm sure they do that) I would tell them to calm down, I have diarrhea and need to get to the bathroom NOW! Then i'd go in get my stuff and leave without changing my clothes.

In all seriousness, I wonder how pregnant and consequently having-to-pee-every-30-minutes women sit through an endowmenent session. It's not like they let you take potty breaks.

Ohhh I know the feeling! Sessions are so tortuous for preggos.

How about not leaving but also refusing to participate? Then there's no catch. You could just say, "oh, I didn't feel comfortable participating in that part."

Not that I've ever been to the temple or think there are any winners in that situation. Purely fantasy.

They would escort you out, and have a little chat with you. At that point you would have to decide if you're in or out. It's all or nothing.

One time a temple worker in Seattle told me that 2 women refused to veil their faces during the true order of prayer. They stopped the whole session, pulled them out and made them meet with the temple president to discuss it. The answer that the president gave was pretty much "I don't know why, you just have to do it"

"I don't know why; you just have to." How many times have we all heard that!

Bow your head and say yes...

And that's why they send the names through several times, right? That, and the fact that more people want to go to the temple more often than they have names to be used just once. (Is that weird to anyone... the whole "attend the temple; we don't have enough work for you to do there, so most of the time you're doing work for someone that's already had it done, but you'll be blessed anyway," thing?)

A great research scientist in her day and now a SAHM raising kids in the morg. Regret the day I introduced her back into the church after her first child was born. Good family sucked into the madness.

...I took a weekend trip to Manti, Utah so I could say goodbye to the temple I thought was the most beautiful to me. I had wanted to get married in that temple, but because my BIC husband's family was huge (and I had major pressure from my MIL to move the ceremony), we were married in Salt Lake instead since the sealing rooms there were larger than those in Manti (the horror of my wedding day is another story). During my last temple visit, I didn't believe in the morg, yet I still held a temple recommend because I hadn't yet discussed my loss of beliefs with my bishop. (At the time, I still believed in Christianity and Christ as my savior but didn't lose those beliefs until the year after leaving the morg.)

I wanted a tour of the temple, more than anything else because I'd heard about how well they constructed the building and put amazingly wonderful personal details throughout it. Fortunately, after the endowment ceremony, I was able to find a sweet old man who gave me a tour and told me about the history of the architecture inside. Going through that tour made it so worthwhile.

But the ceremony was painful. I barely raised my hand and instead of saying, I will or yes, I said, no or I won't (in a whisper). No one heard me. I looked around in dismay as everyone went through the motions. It was the first time I realized how cultish the Mormon Church was.

The absolute best moment was when I left the temple. Another sweet old man stood at the door and said, "Goodbye," and I replied with a huge smile on my face saying, "Goodbye," knowing it was the final farewell to any Mormon temple and I was at peace with my decision. I still had my ward calling to deal with at home, but I was able to feel closure about the temple.

I actually find that building quite lovely and the least "imposing" of the temples. It doesn't give the vibe of the erect member of God towering over you.

I never went to the temple in the five years I was a member. I knew long before joining that the temples was something I never wanted to be a part of.

Wanted to go to a few of them, sit outside with a lawn chair across from it with a few rulers, drawing pad and some pencils and draw a few of them however. But that is only real desire I ever had to go to a temple was to draw one, I never had any intentions not then, not now, not ever, to go inside one.

I think the time to leave would be in the middle of the ceremony when you learn about all the craziness. When the oldster tries to stop you, just look him in the eye and tell him, "False imprisonment is a real crime, enforced by real laws, leaving now is an imaginary crime, enforced by nitwits. Care to put your priesthood power up against that of the district attorney?"

Actually, that would be a great protest. Get a bunch of people into the session, then leave halfway through. If nobody tries to stop you, you just shattered the illusion. If someone does try to stop you, you got one hell of a lawsuit.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/12/2012 02:10PM by forbiddencokedrinker.

Not likely to be a problem.

My wife had kidney stones mid session once - she didn't know it at the time, just knew she had to leave.

There was no drama when she & friend walked out mid session.

if you did not walk out then, like you should have/ really wanted to, you can still back out NOW, because the whole thing was based on exploitation and manipulation by blind siding people. There is no real obligation to honor such tactics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLLaJLX0EFM

I would have gotten up the first time I went but was there for sealing with DW and childdren and upteen members of our ward. I did get out during one session, however, because I was freezing and suffering hypothermia due to the air conditioning. I was taken to the hospital. Gee, it was a good excuse.

Getting Married and Endowed in SLC Temple did it for me.

Decades and decades later I never returned.

Thanks for scaring the sh*t out of me MO- you did me a favor.

BTW- do the old covenants supercede the new light version or

am I still bound by the suicide covenants?



Don't know- Don't care

You're right not to care. I don't know how any self respecting free living constitutional believing person would ever stay in the church after doing the penalties. Sheeple I suppose. Good for you for never returning.

They set it up perfectly-doubly bound by when you go through the first time they encourage as many temple-worthy family members as possible to go through with you, so how in Hell are you going to run away from that? I envy anyone having the courage to bow out if they feel untrue to themselves at moments like those. Because I sure didn't during my first time, and I felt completely out of place, didn't want to let my parents or grandparents know how I felt, so I just played naive and happy-go-lucky about to go serve a mission, and subsequently be depressed every day for two years. Fast forward to when my DW and I go through for her first time, she experienced the exact same feelings of uncomfort, her mom proud at how ALL of her 8 children had gone through, what an enormous blessing, total disregard for how DW truly felt at the time.

I went to the temple while at the MTC getting ready to head out of the country on my mission. I had only been a member of the LDS church for a year, and was already having serious doubts about it. When the temple ceremony told me that I was going to have to vow to keep promises that had not yet been disclosed, I balked. My abusive father had often forced me to promise something undisclosed and then punished me for not living up to it, so there was no way some anonymous recorded voice and a doddering stranger were going to get me to do the same thing.

I wanted to leave, but I was using the mission and the church to get something, so that wasn't an option. Besides which, the person sitting beside me was a friend, and I wasn't going to humilate him as I knew my leaving would do.

So, when the time came, I bowed my head and said, "Not yet." No one noticed, not even the friend at my side. I did not feel in any way bound by the promises that were spoken. I had not sworn to uphold them, and genuinely did not feel that I was under any obligation to do so.

The missionary experience was enough to convince me that the "not yet" was to be a "no".

Awesome!! You were way smarter than me then. I said yes, now I wish I said no. In the end is all bogus anyway.

Why did lucifer not lust when they were naked? I thought Lucifer was evil. I am confused.

He doesn't have a body - so he would have zero interest. Kind of like a 4 year old doesn't lust - no hormones no lust.

That sucks. I thought that too, but in one movie he breaks off a branch of a tree and he obviously picked fruit.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/12/2012 08:35PM by Joe Laban.

I began trembling and shivering in the temple when the "hireling of Satan" appeared wearing the collar of a Catholic priest. I also felt nauseated and light-headed. I was so concerned I wouldn't be able to continue, I didn't even hear much of the what followed in terms of content. Just didn't want to embarrass myself by leaving.

They had explained something about the whole ceremony would have to redone from the beginning if it was interrupted, so I thought EVERYONE would have to start over.

What a nightmare. I can't believe I ever went back. I guess it is a measure of how lonely I was. Someone told me the fact that I was single with five children and they had approached me to go to the temple meant they thought my chances for remarriage were nil.


Anagrammy

Boy, did I ever want to leave. But I was there with my best friend and we'd driven 16 hours, all night long, to get to the nearest temple.

Now I wish I had walked out. She probably would have been furious with me, but if I could do it again, I wouldn't care.