Mormon Temple Rituals part 2

Albert Einstein said, “Teachers of religion must have the stature to give up the archaic doctrine of a personal God, to give up the source of fear which has placed vast power in the hands of the clergy and priests. Such a doctrine is not only unworthy, but fatal, and has done incalculable harm to human spiritual progress.” 

Participating in the Mormon temple rituals definitely did harm to my personal spiritual progress. For decades I believed I was a wretched sinner, whom God could not love without intervention on my behalf. This was a terrible lie that I was clutching tightly in my hands until it was promptly released from my grasp through the discovery of the true history of the church. Once their deception was fully realized in my heart, letting go of those terrible beliefs of my unworthiness, my worthlessness, my shamefulness, and my un-deservingness of living life on my own terms was effortless and immediate as if those once treasured truths had turned into red hot coals cruelly burning my fingers. I still carry scars from where I was damaged by the church’s blazing indoctrination. I still have healing work to do, but I am mending the dreadful damage that was done by the religious fallacy of which I was programmed to believe. 

There are seven covenants made in the temple. The first covenant is associated with the garments, which I will talk about in depth in another post; in that covenant, you promise not to defile the garment (underwear) and to wear it continuously under your clothing, meaning both day and night, no breaks! That covenant is made during the initiatory ceremony which you must go through before going on to the endowment ceremony. You must be wearing your super special undies before you can make these other covenants to 'God'. 

The covenants all have a sign and a token related to the covenant. The signs and tokens are made with your body. You are shown the sign and the given the token by a worker in the temple. Again, women workers cater to the women and men workers cater to the men. The women are seated on the left side of the room and the men are seated on the right side of the room. The wall in front has curtains draped over it which are lifted at different times during the ceremony to reveal a movie screen. You watch a movie about God, Jesus, Satan, Adam, Eve, and the creation of the earth. The movie stops and starts in accordance to the covenant you are making. As the movie progresses, you dress your self in more cloths, adding layers to your already hot attire. Long sleeves and long dresses must be worn on the women, and long sleeves and long pants for the men, all in white of course, because that is the color of purity. We carry our extra cloths in a little bag we take in with us. By the end of the ceremony, we will be wearing all the cloths we brought and then we will fold the little bag up to put it in our pocket. It is quite a sight to see everyone all dressed up in their complete temple clothing. 
This is also how we bury our dead. If your family member was an active, temple attending Mormon at some point in their life, they can be buried in their temple cloths so they will be ready for the first resurrection with Jesus. The hat for the men, and veil for the women, being put on right before they close the casket. The women must veil their faces even in death. 

The second covenant you make is called the Law of Obedience. The women swear to obey their husbands and the men vow to obey only ‘God’. Everyone stands and raises their right arm to the square, bows their head, and says 'yes'. Basically, that is how you make each covenant. This particular oath always bothered me a lot. Why can’t the women covenant to obey 'God' directly as well? Why do we have to go through our husbands, or another man if your not married, in order to be acquainted with God? This is where the shaming of the women in the church begins, treating us like second class members because of our anatomy.

The third covenant is the Law of Sacrifice. This law states that since Jesus died for mankind we must be willing to sacrifice all that we possess including our very lives for the sustaining and defending of the Kingdom of God, aka the Mormon Church. Sadly, many of the pioneers absolutely made that awful sacrifice. This covenant screams out 'cult' to me today! The brain washing runs deep in the temple!

The fourth covenant is the Law of the Gospel. In that covenant we promise to avoid all light-mindedness, loud laughter, evil speaking of the Lord’s anointed, taking the name of God in vain, and every other unholy and impure practice. (That last condition will be talked about a lot when I cover Mormon sexuality!) This fourth covenant, the Law of the Gospel, always troubled me as well. Why can’t we laugh loudly? They say laughter is the best medicine. Why wouldn’t God want us to laugh out loud? LOL! That seems like a very silly and controlling thing to put into a covenant with God. But hey, what do I know? I am just a wicked apostate.

The fifth covenant is the Law of Chastity. It states that you will have no sexual relationships except with your husband and wife to whom you are legally and lawfully wedded. Here is where same sex marriage becoming legal is a huge problem for the church. If it is legal and lawful to marry the same sex, denying this right in the temple becomes an act of discrimination, in my opinion. 

The sixth covenant is the Law of Consecration meaning that you covenant to give of yourself, your time, your talents, everything which God has blessed you with, or which he may bless you with, to the Mormon Church for the building up of the Kingdom of God on Earth and for establishment of Zion. This covenant is essentially Socialism. Mormons were, and still are, Socialists or Collectivists. Either way, the early Mormons lived this Law of Consecration for a time in the early days of the church under the United Order with Joseph Smith, and especially when they first arrived in Utah under Brigham Young. Socialism saved the early settlers of Utah from starving. Basically, everyone handed over everything they owned to the church then it was distributed back to those families according to the circumstances, wants, and needs of each individual family unit within the church. Although Mormons no longer practice this Law today, it is supposed to be practiced once again, just like polygamy, most likely when Christ returns or just before. 

The last and seventh covenant you make is to keep the secret signs, names, and tokens revealed to you in the temple, unrevealed. You promise under no condition, even at the danger of your life, will you ever reveal them to others, or God will punish you somehow, someday. So, technically, I'm risking the wrath of God just by writing about these things in this blog and in my book. This is a fear tactic to keep temple attendees in nice, perfect rows, like simple sheep. 

 In the temple, we also are taught the true order of prayer. It is during this part of the endowment ceremony that the women in the room must all veil their faces. Men can pray openly to God without hiding their face, but the women are not allowed to pray that way in the ‘purest’ form of prayer. This activity takes place near the end of the long endowment ceremony. Men and women stand in a circle surrounding the altar. At this point we have on multiple layers of clothing, which for the women includes the garments, a bra, a slip, longs socks or tights, slippers, a long dress with long sleeves, a long robe, a long sash, an apron, and a mid-length veil to cover their hair and face. The men have are in their garments, a long sleeved shirt, long pants, sock, slippers, long robe, long sash, apron, and a silly looking 'bakers'  type of hat with a string coming off of it so they can tie it to their robe. That’s a lot of freaking cloths! Before the prayer can begin all the women attendee’s in the room must veil their faces. It reminded me of Islamic countries where the women must be completely covered from their heads to their toes with no skin showing at all, except their hands. It was stifling in those thick layers of clothing! We had been in that room for over an hour and a half already. Several times over the course of the many years I was attending the temple, I would feel faint at this point in the ritual, most especially when I was pregnant. I would always hope that the man offering the prayer would keep it short so I could breathe fresh air again verses the stuffy, hot air under my stupid, concealing veil.

It always puzzled me why the women must obscure their faces while praying in the most correct form of prayer? I truly believe it is because of the story of Eve. All of this second class status of women is based on the biblical account of the Garden of Eden. A woman tasted of the ‘forbidden fruit’ first, and women have been punished for that ever since. Yet, if Eve had not partaken, according to this myth, mankind would not exist. Eve rebelled against a law that had to be broken in order for Life to occur. She was the one that had the determination to do what needed to be done even though it went against ‘God’s’ rules. Seems to me she was smarter than Adam. If it had been left to him in this story, we wouldn’t be. Instead of being punished for this act of courage, women should be honored for all life comes through them, and that is not a curse. It is a beautiful blessing. Women create, nurture, and grow Life!
          There is a Native American belief, on the subject of honoring women, which I think has been deliberately erased in this patriarchal religion. It is stated like this, “The Elders say the men should look at women in a sacred way. The men should never put women down or shame them in any way. When we have problems, we should seek their counsel. We should share with them openly. A woman has intuitive thought. She has access to another system of knowledge that few men develop. She can help us understand. We must treat her in a good way.” The plain truth is, it is a heavy load the women of the church have to carry, and the men in authority don’t seem to care, or understand, the pressures they put on the women, and the young women, in the church to be perfect, faultless, and flawless. Yet, women have a clear, unmistakable relationship to their intuition that very few men want to even understand. Women could benefit the church in so many leadership roles if they were only viewed as equal partners instead of treated as second class members. This is why I support the ordination of women into the priesthood. I would love to see women in more authoritative roles in the church in the future. 

I truly love this vision as well, presented by Sonia Johnson, an ex-Mormon; she says, “One of my favorite fantasies is that next Sunday not a single woman, in any country of the world, will go to church. If women simply stopped giving our time and energy to the institutions that oppress, they could cease to be.” Amen, sister! It’s just like the Chinese proverb that says, “When sleeping women wake, mountains will move!” When will the women of the church finally wake up? What I know for sure is this; when the women actually do wake up, watch out! They will be a mighty force to be reckoned with.

 The warning that Satan dramatically delivers at the end of the temple film to the participants of the endowment ceremony is this, Satan says with a sinister smile, “I have something to say concerning these people.” Then Satan looks directly into the camera at the audience staring directly into your eyes, “If they do not walk up to every covenant that they make at these altars in this temple, this day, they will be in my power!” It is a dreadfully, genuine threat of a satanic attack, meant to frighten the members into believing that if we ever leave the church Satan will have our Souls; and, we will literally be in his power and control. Again, can you say 'cult'? I think so!
           There you have it. Those are the covenants you make in the temple with the Law of Obedience being the first and most important covenant you make in the endowment ceremony. Obedience is everything in this church. Obeying those in ‘authority’ over you is a fundamental teaching in the church. It all comes down to obedience; giving up your true sovereignty. Because the truth is, no one has authority over you. You are a beautiful, sovereign being!

Religion is a matter of geography. Kids are conditioned into accepting the beliefs of their families. What a wonderful world this would be if religion wasn’t allowed to be taught until children reached the age of 18. I doubt many eighteen year old's would buy into the same religious crap that is easily sold to eight year old's, not many little kids have bullshit detectors yet! 

The church teaches members to “doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith”. (President Dieter F. Uchtdorf) I believe what Robert Goldberg said about doubt, “Doubt is not a step away from faith; doubt is a step away from indoctrination!” It was the best thing ever when I was able to give myself permission to doubt and question my religion; and, finally step away from my childhood programming!

In my next post, I will get very personal as I reveal my own experience of going through the temple for the first time, over 25 years ago. 

Namaste!

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