Family Tree House of Horrors XIV

A post on fMh today reminded me of something I wanted to write about.

T and I just celebrated 10 years of marriage. Awesome eh! Well personally I’m thinking of getting a divorce but I’ll explain that more fully in a later post.

I’d rather celebrate the 15 years that we have been together, since to me, our wedding day was a sham.

For those of you unfamiliar with Mormon weddings there is a VERY strong theme in the lessons at church about getting married in the temple. For women especially, it is THE goal (then popping out kids, followed hopefully not too closely by the big trip to heaven). To be married in the temple you must be ‘pure’ and have interviews with church leaders to satisfy them that you are pure. We passed… although in all honesty we kind of pulled the wool over their eyes with that one ;)

The next thing you need to know is that the only people who can attend your temple wedding are Mormons who have also passed all the requirements to enter the temple. This brought the grand total of friends and family members who could join us in the temple (and afford the trip to Sydney) to 5! 4 friends of T’s who already lived in Sydney… and his mum.

Fast forward to the day before my wedding. It was time for me to go to the temple for some personal ceremonies preparatory to marriage. T had already been through his ceremonies in 1996 when he began his 2 year mission to New Zealand. Women generally wait for marriage to be Initiated. Now, it was… odd, to say the least. I was freaked out. I was scared to death of the prospect of going nude (as cruelly highlighted in the temple preparation class I attended). As it turned out, the nudity was actually perfectly acceptable to me. There was a lovely sheet for me to wear (think Halloween ghost costume). The next ceremony was less nude but more ridiculous. I wanted to laugh but everyone else was so damn serious. I held it together and just started counting the hours to my wedding.

That night I was roomy with my MIL. T spent the night at a friend’s house, lucky bugger. Now, it is important to clarify here that I like my MIL. This is not a rant about her; this is a description of the circumstances surrounding my wedding. MIL is a character involved here but I lay no blame whatsoever with her. Sticking out in my mind is a conversation MIL and I had that evening. Somehow I found myself listening to stories about T. No harm in that you might think. Well yes, it was pretty well fine until we got to the story about a particular young lady that he was going to run away with when he was around 16. Hmmm. All I want to say here is that…well, this just really wasn’t very helpful to me in preparation for the big day.

The countdown continued. It was all I could do to get myself through the surrounding craziness. I shut off. Pictures of our wedding day highlight this disconnect. I may post some here. Let me think about that for a bit.

We re-entered the temple and were married, for ‘time and all eternity’. Oh, and don’t forget that wording… I committed to ‘give myself’ to T. He committed to ‘receive me’….*@#$!! … Just a technicality to leave room for those other wives to join us later ;)

The deed was done. We ‘smiled’ for photos, ate a lovely meal together (all 7 of us!) and suffered the sly looks and winks as we said goodbye and made our way to the hotel. From here on out it gets a little X-rated so we’ll leave those two lovebirds to enjoy themselves.

So, I had not a single family member or friend in attendance. No joyous celebration of a significant occasion. No friendly arm to hold on to. No happy familiar face to smile into. Fuck it’s a sad story. My wedding . My sham.

For all of the Mormons talk of ‘forever families’ this sad scenario is repeated many times all around the world. Some sick horror show played out supposedly to solidify our family tree.

A bit of gore on the side

Hey, so I'm feeling particularly pissed off today and thought I'd let off some steam here. Rather than talk about my problems I would like to just behave 'badly'.

Background info.

When you go to the temple for the first time you are given a 'new name' and are put under covenant never to divulge it except at a certain place shown to you in the temple. The women give their 'new names' to their husbands at a pivotal point in the ceremony. The men never reveal their 'new name' to their wives *#@*!

The punishment for revealing your name used to be having your throat slit anddisembowelment . If you were to visit the temple today you would find that the penalty has been removed. Now you just covenant that you will never reveal the secrets of the temple. I have friends who visited the temple prior 1990 (when this change occurred) and made the hand motions to slit their own throats and disembowel themselves. How serene!

My 'new name' is/was Deborah.

T revealed his 'new name' to me a few months ago when I remembered we still had this odd little secret to disclose.

So, which fine upstanding Mormon would like the honour of slitting my throat and disemboweling me?

Women as Property

About 8 months ago Rockstar and I attended a Sealing ceremony (marriage ceremony) at our local Mormon temple. It was done ‘by proxy’ meaning that we were participating on behalf of people who have died. Their living relatives having submitted their names to the temple to have them baptised, married and endowed.

At the time I was already beginning to question my faith in the religion but I was happy enough to be there that day. I felt quite peaceful all dressed in white, spending some time with my partner in a quiet and sacred place. As there is quite a bit of repetition in the ceremony I began to try and memorise the words (a little habit of mine). It didn’t take long for me to realise that the vows were different for the husband and wife. I listened more closely and confirmed that there was a significant and shocking difference. The man agrees to “receive her unto yourself”. The woman agrees to “give yourself to him”. (Full text can be found online in a basic search). There was no mention of the husband ‘giving himself’ or of the wife ‘receiving her husband’.

Disturbed by this I later asked the temple worker why there was a difference in the vows. He was surprised by my question and said that no-one had ever asked him that before. Then, thinking on the spot, he said (from memory) “well isn’t that what a woman does, give herself to her husband?”…… What! like a nicely wrapped present with a big fuckin’ puffy, satin bow!? #@%# ….. Well, I began to say how I really didn’t see how that explained anything when a higher-ranking member intervened and began to expound to me about how men and women are equal in the church. The other family members who were with us for this ceremony were visibly uncomfortable by this point. Feeling very unsatisfied I let it be.

When I later had the ear of my Bishop, and on another occasion a representative from the Stake Presidency, neither could give me any decent explanation. They asked me why such a thing should matter and insinuated that my feminist leanings were not exactly welcome.

Now, what turned this irk of mine into a full-blown grievance was a little diddy I discovered at feministmormonhousewives.org. Apparently (now, I have not been back to the temple to verify this for myself - although I did think about doing so, as up until last Thursday, I still had a current temple recommend) … apparently the leadership has in the last few months changed the wording of these vows. Now the woman agrees to “receive him unto herself” but still no mention of the man “giving himself”.

Well I’m sorry but instead of fixing the inequality, as far as I can see ‘they’ just created a big fucking obvious mole that says there is a really significant reason why the man cannot say that he ‘gives himself to his wife’. Hmmm, does this reason have something to do with the other 6 young doe-eyed, big-breasted virgins that the man gets to unwrap, I mean marry, in the next life???