Heaven – Zelophehad's Daughters

Gays and the Mormon Afterlife

Guest9 January 20176 Comments

This guest post comes from a regular ZD reader going by the name of Humboldt.

Yesterday, I was talking to my mom about a mutual acquaintance of ours who happens to be gay. He’s the son of a very strong Mormon family that mentored my parents and our family decades ago. He and I went to BYU at about the same time, so I know him too. We were talking about some family photos that had been posted on Facebook, when my mom made the comment that it’s a good thing that our mutual acquaintance isn’t married. Her implication was that gay marriage was intrinsically so wrong, so disordered, so sinful, that it would be better for gay people to live life alone than be married. This was a pretty shocking idea to me, so rather than ask her more about why she would say this, I moved the conversation along, as I usually do when I’m feeling threatened. Read More

In Belief, Faith, Heaven, Heavenly Mother, Temple, Theology, Trusting God

“What is God really like?”

Galdralag3 January 20135 January 20139 Comments

When Beatrice and I were serving together as missionaries, we were lucky enough to be in a district that included the mission offices. The APs and office Elders were in our district, so more often than not we held district meetings in a cozy conference room in the main mission office building, giving us frequent occasion to see the Mission President and his wife.

Throughout our companionship, Beatrice mentioned to me that she had questions about the role of women as depicted in the temple endowment. We discussed it a few times in companionship study, and then – taking advantage of our proximity to the mission leaders – one day we decided to take the issue to the wife of the MP. To be clear, we didn’t openly dissect elements of the endowment that are considered private or sacred. We talked about the sorts of things that are commonly parsed on fMh, Exponent II, and here at ZD: the hearken covenant; women veiling their faces; the almost complete silence of Eve and lack of other female characters in the pre-mortal realm; and other, similar issues. Read More

In Gender Issues, Heaven

Can Women Be Exalted?

Lynnette23 April 20083 January 200979 Comments

One of the questions which came up in my post last fall about my reservations concerning the doctrine of Heavenly Mother was that of female exaltation more generally. It’s an issue that’s been at the back of my mind ever since. The discussion on my recent poll about the Celestial Kingdom inspired me to re-visit the topic, and attempt to sort out what thoughts on the subject I have thus far. Read More

In Heaven, Polls

Do You Want to Go to the Celestial Kingdom?

Lynnette17 April 20083 January 2009102 Comments

{democracy:27}

I have to admit that I’ve never been all that enthusiastic about the Celestial Kingdom. As a kid, I think I imagined it being like church all the time–not exactly an inspirational thought. And I find the scriptural descriptions of it to be rather off-putting. Streets of gold? Glory, thrones, and dominions? If a sign-up sheet describing a field trip to such a locale came around Relief Society, I’d probably decline. Read More