Reason 27 – POLYGAMY

The LDS church and it’s active-going members often distance themselves from known FLDS religious groups.

https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/protecting-the-churchs-identity

They often claim to not be involved with the FLDS; state that they do not associate with them or approve of any of their practices.

https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/protecting-the-churchs-identity

But that would be hypocritical of the LDS church; wouldn’t it?

Considering that the very founder of the LDS church started it all in the first place?

https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/additional-resource/media-letter

Joseph Smith, the founder and first “prophet” of the modern day LDS church introduced the practice of polygamy into LDS doctrines.

The church prefers to call Joseph’s actions, “plural marriage,” to try and diminish the seriousness of actions in which Joseph was involved.

But the church has always been quick to defend itself, so that comes as no surprise.

https://askgramps.org/did-emma-smith-know-josephs-sealings-other-women/

Joseph not only married other women, but he did so behind the back of his first wife, Emma Smith; all in the name of following alleged “revelation” to participate in the practice from God Himself.

And while the LDS church debates and argues that the marriages “weren’t for sex,” “just for eternity alone,” etc; the fact of the matter remains, in which Joseph was involved with multiple women;

At the expense of the heartbreak of his first wife, Emma.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/emma-hale-smith?lang=eng

Some claim that it was “normal” for younger girls to get married at their age.

That these “marriages” were only sealings and spiritual connections that would bring about eternal life.

That doesn’t sound like a con to you??

A ploy to be involved with multiple women at once?

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/joseph-smith-and-plural-marriage?lang=eng

I mean, it was all done in secret as well; hidden from some of the church’s own members.

Joseph knew what he was doing. And he was trying to normalize the polygamist relationships; slowly introduce it. Desensitize his followers to it.

And members to this day still try to defend his actions; try to claim that Joseph truly was acting in Godliness.

I mean, the church does indeed have a history and current-day tradition of sexism and the abuse of women; banning them from holding spiritual priesthood authority, claiming their biggest value is at home raising children…seeing women as sexual objects.

https://floodlit.org/

So why are we surprised?

https://history.churchofjesuschrist.org/chd/individual/ellen-rockwood-1829?lang=eng

You know who that sounds like to us?

A little group called the FLDS; the Fundamentalist Latter-Day Saints.

The church likes to claim it has no relation or connection to the FLDS.

And yet…

The FLDS are a group of LDS members who broke off from the LDS church when the LDS church discontinued the practice of polygamy due to social backlash.

The FLDS believed the practice, introduced by Joseph smith, should continue. And so, the FLDS were created.

https://abcnews.com/US/things-didnt-flds-church/story?id=30827256

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamentalist_Church_of_Jesus_Christ_of_Latter-Day_Saints

And who later appeared to lead the FLDS group? A very well-known, infamous person by the name of, you guessed it…

https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/commentary/mormons-and-polygamy

The church constantly claims that they have no connection whatsoever to Warren Jeffs or the FLDS. The church preaches that the practice of polygamy was discontinued because, well, God said so. The LDS church condemns and rebukes the fact that the FLDS continued the practice when the LDS discontinued it.

However,

It’s like the church seems to forget that THEIR PROPHET was the one who introduced the practice in the first place.

https://www.instagram.com/floodlitorg?stkn=OTF3ZHB5bnhnZGNh

The LDS church continues to condemn the actions of the FLDS groups; for the same actions that their own founding prophet had also once engaged in.

As much as the LDS church tries to distance itself;

This history cannot, and should not, be erased.

After all,

Anything involving the manipulation or abuse of women and children most definitely deserved to stay in the light.

This history should make the church feel as though they are sitting on a hot iron and being interrogated constantly.

And what’s disgusting, is how church members still actively try to defend the old practice of polygamy.

They claim that the “marriages” to Joseph had no evidence of sexual intimacy; that the marriages to young girls were “for eternity alone.”

And yet…

One of Joseph’s successors…

Definitely did not believe the same regarding the topic.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/brigham-young?lang=eng

Brigham young.

Same exact title held as Joseph smith.

Prophet of the LDS church.

Same access to the revelation Joseph smith himself received.

Same leadership and role as Joseph.

And his involvement in polygamy?

Not only involved minor girls;

But offspring,

The very evidence needed that these marriages did indeed involve sexual relations;

And not for “eternity alone.”

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/brigham-young?lang=eng

But people don’t like to think about it.

They are told there is not much evidence to back up the exact known relationships between Joseph and his “wives.”

So active members turn a blind eye and shrug it off. Say “it was normal for that time for girls to get married so young.”

https://history.churchofjesuschrist.org/chd/individual/lucy-bigelow-young-1830?lang=eng

But this would be just like claiming “it was normal back then for women not to have voting rights. It was normal back then that women would not have their own bank account or property. It was normal back then for women to have to rely on the men around them for survival.”

https://www.motleyrice.com/sexual-abuse/childhood-sexual-abuse/lds-church

Just because something becomes “normalized,” does not mean it should be accepted.

Activist groups have always existed, and always will.

And Joseph smith and his church?

They were definitely “persecuted” and opposed by the people around them.

And maybe;

The persecution wasn’t because Joseph brought about a “new religion” and those who opposed had “hardened hearts;”

Maybe it was because of secret child marriage, fraud, and scams.

https://history.churchofjesuschrist.org/chd/individual/clarissa-clara-decker-1828?lang=eng

Any person that can justify the marriages of young girls to grown men in the name of God…

Are blind, ignorant, and actively choosing not to see the truth.

Who in their right minds would agree and defend a grown man who claimed that God told him to take multiple wives, some being minor girls, and claim that his actions were legitimate??

These are the same actions Warren Jeffs involved himself in.

And yet, the active LDS members refuse to see the connections;

…much like the current-day FLDS groups who refused to accept Samuel Bateman for participating in the same things their previous leader, Warren Jeffs, did.

The people within the cult are generally strategically blinded to the bias within their own walls.

https://history.churchofjesuschrist.org/chd/individual/elizabeth-fairchild-1831?lang=eng

But sure.

If people want to believe that this “revelation” of “plural marriage” to Joseph came from God,

Then what’s stopping this “revelation” from making a return to the modern age?

Nothing.

Nothing is stopping it.

Nothing save it be a prophet who can claim one day that the practice is returning.

https://history.churchofjesuschrist.org/chd/individual/helen-mar-kimball-1828?lang=eng

And who knows?

Maybe the current, modern-day prophets are practicing polygamy today.

After all,

Didn’t Joseph Smith initially keep his involvement in polygamy a secret from the rest of the church?

Have you ever considered that there would be nothing stopping modern prophets from doing the same thing today?

Without you even knowing about it?

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics/plural-marriage?lang=eng

And of course, modern-day members CLAIM that the practice of polygamy is no longer a “thing” in the LDS Church…

However,

The LDS church STILL practices polygamy.

Just in a different, more “modern” way.

https://askgramps.org/fairness-temple-sealings/

Although, some active members may try to deny this fact about the church; say we don’t understand Sealings, claim that it’s something spiritual and not sexual; claim that the sealings in the afterlife is godly knowledge that we don’t understand until we die.

Convenient.

And yet, men may be sealed to multiple women while alive in this lifetime; but their other “wives” are merely already passed away.

So the men may continue to practice polygamy and have multiple wives in the afterlife.

Whereas women are denied those same rights.