Oppressing the Widows

Every time I go to an LDS church, I’m reminded that there is still so much work to do. This week, I sat in sacrament meeting listening to talks on Doctrine and Covenants 80-83 (my thoughts on D&C here). These sections are primarily about caring for each other in the church, particularly widows and orphans. So no one thinks I’m calling a specific member out, the talks were fine. Honestly, some of the better ones I’ve heard in a while as they focused on taking care of others instead of temple and prophet worship. The reason my ears perked up at these talks (and my stomach soured) was not the talks themselves but rather, what they reminded me:

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints holds policies in place that actively harm and abuse widows and their children.

Let me say that again. The LDS church, which should by its own scriptures be specifically caring for widows, has doctrines and policies that specifically target and hurt widows and the fatherless.

It’s clear that the canonical Christian God cares deeply about widows:

“Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor.” Zechariah 7:10

“The Lord watches over the foreigner and sustains the fatherless and the widow.” Psalms 146:9

“He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing.” Deuteronomy 10:18

“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress.” James 1:27

(Also note the commandment to care for the foreigner…)

The LDS church today breaks this commandment through its doctrines and policies of eternal polygamy. Once again, yes, everything is polygamy.

As I’ve written numerous times, the church still very much believes in polygamy. It’s never formally disavowed polygamy as an unrighteous practice, nor untangled its legacy and what it means for members in the future eternal kingdoms they are working so hard to qualify for. Because despite what members may say, the church absolutely continues to practice eternal polygamy today in its sealing practices.

Sealings are essentially temple marriages which, according to doctrine, bind a couple together as married for eternity. There is no “til death do you part.” Most find this a comforting doctrine and the idea of eternal family units that continue beyond death is beautiful. However, sealings are also directly tied to past and present polygamous practices.

What happens when a spouse, who you’re sealed to forever, dies?

For a man, that’s simple. The church says that a man who loses his wife can be sealed to another wife without issue. Both of the two highest men in the church are in this situation and proudly proclaim to be eternal polygamists, testifying that they will live with both of their wives in the eternities. This pattern can continue if the second, third, or even fourth wife dies. There is no limit to how many wives a man can be sealed to.

For a woman, it’s exceptionally more complicated. If a woman’s husband dies, she cannot be sealed to her next husband. Women may only ever be sealed to one man (because polygamy) and so if she desires to be sealed to her second husband she must have her sealing to her first husband cancelled. Cancelling the sealing is like a divorce but with extremely eternal consequences.

Because the church teaches that the family unit continues after death only if family members are sealed together, a husband who has been divorced from his family due to sealing cancellation now is no longer sealed to anyone, including his own children. Most women, very understandably, don’t want to cancel their sealings to their first husbands if they’ve passed away. They chose to keep that sealing even after they remarry. Her second husband then can never be eternally sealed to her. Now, the second love of her life is left out in the cold, forever separated from her and their children.

Here’s the real kicker—any children that are born to that woman and her second husband are therefore sealed to the first, dead husband. This means that husband number 2 is not only not connected through sealing to his wife in the eternities, his own biological children belong to another man and follow that family unit (again, because polygamy).

Women are forced to make a choice that will literally rip families apart and leave at least one man they loved eternally cut off. Their children must deal with the trauma of not knowing who they belong to in the eternities and that they may lose their own father. Meanwhile, men are allowed to simply grow and grow their eternal family without having to make such heartbreaking decisions. (And force their wives to eternally share him without their consent but that’s another post.)

In a church that constantly preaches temples, covenants, and eternal families, we are horrifically separating and torturing families as sacrifices on the altar of eternal polygamy.

Widows who try to date LDS men frequently report that they are treated as pariahs because men do not want to marry someone that they can’t have their own eternal family with, creating even more heartache. The men who do marry widows are faced with knowing that their own children belong to a stranger and that they will be eternally separated from them and the women they love. It’s little wonder there is grief untold in these families’ stories.

As Carol Lynn Pearson writes in her poignant book, The Ghost of Eternal Polygamy, women are actively harmed by this incredibly sexist imbalance in sealing practices. Widows are hurt directly by the church and its policies. They are forced to endure the agony of choosing between two men they love to spend eternity with and the immense pressure of who to tie their children to. Pearson quotes in her book many stories from every day LDS members living with this very real pain and suffering. (Please go read this book!) You can also find many stories shared online.

Widows—and their children who are affected by this as well—must suffer through extra sorrow and misery that widowers will never have to suffer because of the church’s policies and doctrines of eternal polygamy. This is abusive. The church that is supposed to love and care for widows is instead harming them. And that harm is completely unnecessary given that polygamy is supposedly no longer practiced today (and not even from God in the first place).

But the church hierarchy doesn’t even care. They will simply say (as I know from first hand experience trying to explain this to a general authority) to “just have faith and God will work it all out in the end.” Great, sure. Most of us have a lot of faith that God will make all things right in the end. But don’t you think God is angry that we are actively hurting the people They directly told us to take care of over and over?! Don’t you think it’s a pretty crappy God that allows women to suffer so much turmoil on earth just so Their supposed church can uphold an abusive power structure from the 19th century?! If the church and the Mormon God truly cared about widows—and women in general—they would allow equal sealing practices for men and women.

Optimistic me agrees with Carol Lynn Pearson’s conclusion: that it’s entirely plausible for the church to disavow polygamy as a bad historical practice, similar to the policy of exclusion for black members, and then equalize it’s sealing practices. Everyone could be sealed to everyone, all living together in heaven in one great community of God’s family without borders or possession.

But the cynical part of me fears that will never happen. Because the LDS church has proven time and time again that it must protect polygamy at all costs, both eternal and historical. Their entire foundation of priesthood power and authority IS polygamy. Because if they admit that Joseph Smith made up polygamy and it was never a real commandment, then how can they say they hold God’s authority passed down to them? If they change policies of eternal polygamy to equal sealing practices, then they must answer serious questions about why women are still barred from equal participation in leadership and priesthood. That would challenge their authority as men and the power structures that place them on top. Everything is tied up in the weeds of polygamy, a doctrine the Brethren can’t dismantle without taking out the foundations of the Brighamite movement.

It seems to me the modern day Latter-day Saint church worships power and authority more than it worships God. It cares more about upholding its structures of power than uplifting women, minorities, and LGBTQ+ individuals. If they pull the plug on polygamy, they might drain themselves of authority because polygamy is the main vestige that allows them to discriminate in God’s name and call it holy. Polygamy means that every one who isn’t a white, cisgender, heterosexual man is literally worth less. As Pearson puts it so gut-wrenchingly, 5 pennies of women equal one nickel of a man. When groups of people are doctrinally and eternally less than, it’s okay to continue their oppression. So long as eternal polygamy haunts us, the current hierarchy can continue to justify their sexism, racism, and homophobia because polygamy means there is an eternal hierarchy.

Yesterday the church dropped a new Q&A on polygamy in their gospel topics section. While it does take some steps forward on clearing the air around polygamy, it’s overall disingenuous and misleading, leaving out several critical things I mentioned above. It states that the church no longer practices polygamy but neglects to mention eternal polygamy through sealings. I went to bed angry and woke up angry. This kind of handwaving and half-truths does nothing but further entrenches us in the mud.

Note how in the above section it mentions men being sealed to multiple women and that deceased men/women can be sealed to other dead spouses, but it says nothing about women not being able to be sealed to a second living spouse! Until this is equalized, polygamy will always haunt us. Until the church can admit that polygamy wasn’t ever right or godly in the first place, people will still suffer and struggle under its weight.

You cannot say that no one will be forced into marriage arrangements while allowing men to seal themselves to multiple spouses when the dead can’t give consent. You cannot say that everything will just work out in heaven while you harm widows on earth, forcing them to pick between husbands and who to tie their children to. You cannot say that polygamy is part of the past while sealing practices continue to follow strictly polygamous precedents.

Equalize sealing practices. The current ones only exist to continue to uphold sexist 19th century practices that supposedly we don’t do anymore. Stop making eternity about individual family units and open it up to a wide, diverse family of God that doesn’t require male possession of women and children. Let everyone be sealed together regardless of sex, including same sex couples. Clinging onto polygamy only serves to uphold male power structures and oppress women, minorities, and LGBTQ individuals.