It was early in the morning on a Saturday.

I sat in the baptistry of the Los Angeles Temple, waiting for sisters from my ward to finish. Four young single adults walked in and sat together in a nearby row: boy, girl, boy, girl. They were also waiting for my group, not to end their time at the temple as was my case, but to begin.

An older gentleman, dressed in white, slowly walked over until he stood in front of them, and asked in a voice loud enough for me to hear, “Which one of you wants to baptize, and which one of you wants to serve as witness?” The young woman furthest away from me was the first to answer. Clearly and confidently, she said, “I want to baptize.” The previously calm temple worker threw up his hands and shook his head emphatically as he cried, “No! No! No! I wasn’t talking to you!”

Read More

Dear Foremother:

As I hold this card and read your name, I think about your country, your century, your life you left long ago. Your existence in a world without antibiotics, with no choice but unmedicated child birth. Because I have this card, I know you have been baptized by proxy, released from a prison that held your spirit and welcomed into the fold of the faithful. You’ve been confirmed a member of the church, my church, a church you didn’t even know existed when you walked this earth, should you choose to accept this ordinance done for you in your name. You’ve been washed and anointed, a proxy body gently blessed with words that are specific, delicate, and surging with power.

Read More

Earlier this year, my bishop announced that we had a ward challenge. Each family was challenged “to bring two family names to the temple to have their work done by April.” In January, I felt sure this task would be easily accomplished. In February, I decided that since it was such a short month, I wouldn’t worry about it too much. In March, I started to wonder if the challenge ended on April 1^st or April 30^th… the ambiguous “by April,” declaration tempted me with an argument as to why I could not get the work done until May. But, by the end of March, I accomplished what had become my goal. It was uncomfortable, I had a lot on my plate. I needed help. Relatives who are genealogy buffs pretty much did the electronic work for me. I just had to print the cards. A friend acted as proxy for the baptisms and confirmations. I did the initiatory for both and one endowment. I handed the second proxy card to a stranger in the temple who agreed to do the other endowment.

So- how did I feel after? I did feel good. I am glad I did it. But my motivation was not really for me, it was for someone else. Sadly, it was not for my dead ancestor. It was for my bishop. He asked me to do it, so I did it. I really felt nothing spiritually, though I have felt inspired to do work for the dead before. This– well, it was about obedience. For some, attending the temple is a joy and an indulgence. For some, it brings relief and edification. For some, it brings confusion and disharmony. But we are commanded to attend and participate in the ordinances which means that attending the temple is an expression of obedience.

Read More

by Em

In recent months I have been thinking a great deal about redemption. As members of the Church, one of our main purposes is to redeem the dead.  It is not a light thing to become a redeemer and to walk in the Savior’s shoes.  But what does it mean to redeem them? How are we supposed to do that?  The glib Sunday School answer would probably involve attending the temple regularly, ideally with family names in tow.  All it takes to redeem someone from damnation is their full name, at least one important date from their life, and a series of ceremonies.  Congratulations! Dead person redeemed.  Luckily church extraction has made it so you can go to the temple without doing any of the bothersome finding people bit.  Some stranger thousands of miles from here thoughtfully redeemed my great-grandmother for me through the wonders of the extraction program (yes, I am annoyed about this.)

I have come to the conclusion that pink slips of paper are not what redeem our grandmothers, nor is checking off ordinances the fulfillment of the promise that our hearts would turn to our mothers and our mothers’ hearts would turn to us.  I have nothing against doing temple work, and I do believe it is an important component of redeeming the dead.  I just don’t think that is the whole picture.

Read More

This last Sunday, we had combined Relief Society and Priesthood opening exercises owing to the Young Women needing rehearsal space for a fireside planned for that evening. Forgotten announcements of the switch resulted in a slow but eventual gathering. In the temporarily combined room, the seating arrangement resulted in a change in the average seating patterns, which in turn resulted in people sitting and chatting with people whom they might not routinely sit with. This was not uncomfortable for me; I rather like a good mix up- besides- it was just for opening exercises.

In this, I began to notice something interesting. It seems to me that “average” church meeting small talk is along the line of “how are you/your family doing?” But in this meeting, and in other interactions I have had in the last few weeks with church members, the small and big talk is focused on the recently announced change in missionary age.

In nearly every conversation, the reaction is one of happy excitement; 18 year old males who had thought they had a year to prepare are suddenly, yet happily questioning if they should go sooner. Further, it seems to me that a very large number of women between the ages of 19 and 20 have already spoken to their bishops and are in the process of submitting their papers (I personally know of 3).

Interestingly, in this combined meeting moment, a member of the Stake Presidency pointed out an observation of his that seemed to almost border on a concern. This was that males still had to be ordained as Elders before they could serve; hence, they would need to be sustained in Stake Conference. I do not know why this seemed to concern him (perhaps a Stake admin issue that could be challenging?), but I could not help but consider the implications in relation to age. Based on a male’s birth date, high school graduation date and stake conference scheduling, it is possible that he could very well still be 19 years old the soonest he is eligible to serve a mission.

If this is the case, and a young man was anxious to serve a mission, is there an equality argument for males to forgo Melchizedek priesthood ordination in order to be as readily eligible to serve as un-ordianed women?

Read More

My temple recommend interview is coming up. One question that always confuses me is: are you honest in your dealings with your fellow men?

I think this question is asked to make sure you are not lying, stealing, cheating, living a double-life, or conducting business fraud. However, I always interpret it as: Are you always 100% completely honest?

How do you answer that question? If I say “Yes” I am inevitably lying. So I always say “No.” To which my leaders usually chuckle and I quickly explain “I mean I don’t willfully lie or hurt anybody, but I’m sure I’ve told a lies in the last two years. In fact I’m lying to you right now by answering all these questions about prophets, belief and faith with one word answers because it is all so much more complicated than that.” I sometimes have the presence of mind to leave out the last part, but normally I have mouth diarrhea the second I am stuck in a room with an authority figure and cannot seem to figure out the line between information that my leaders need-to-know and what is none-of-their-business.

After one such meeting, I decided that I would try to live my life without telling any lies (mind you this was the hyper-religious OCD college Whoa-man at Ricks College in Rexburg and not the uber-critical culturally relative academic Whoa-man now). Right then and there I committed to being 100% honest.

I have many weaknesses, but some things I’ve never lacked for are determination, stick-to-it-ness, or obsessive-compulsive behavior. So when I say 100%, I mean 100 freaking percent.

That night there was a church fireside. In college everyone went to these because we were all single and spent about 90% of our time checking out the opposite sex. I arrived and saw some of my friends. One of them was named Andrew. He was a cute guy from the South. We were semi-flirty, just on the precipice of going out. We all sat together and just as we were taking our seats, Andrew noticed I had a Band-Aid on my finger and nonchalantly asked, “Oh, did you cut yourself?”

Read More