DiscussMormonism.com

The Mormon practice of Baptism for the dead is a hot-button topic of late. The odd thing about it is that baptism isn't what makes one officially a Mormon, even for the living. Confirmation formally makes one an official member of the Mormon church. Confirmation and any subsequent ordinances are performed only after a baptism has been "accepted." To think otherwise doesn't seem to make any sense.

Confirmations are performed for the deceased, usually a period of time after they've been baptized by proxy. Personally, I can see how confirmations for the dead may potentially be more offensive to non-Mormons than baptisms for the dead. Confirming a deceased person a member of the Mormon church implies that the deceased has indeed accepted his or her Mormon baptism. Temple ordinances for the dead follow the same assumption.

What makes the whole thing even odder is the Mormon belief that everyone will have the chance to hear and accept the gospel in the Resurrection. Why not just let folks decide for themselves then?

Between baptizing the dead, confirming the dead, and performing sometimes unscrupulous baptisms for the living (Baseball Baptisms), it could appear that Mormons are willing to, well, sort of trick or bully people into heaven.

My family may very well baptize me by proxy after I die, and that doesn't offend me anymore; however, I can see how confirming the dead might seem very presumptuous to outsiders, especially if non-Mormons understood exactly what that ordinance does for the living.

Just some thoughts.

I wish everyone a wonderful weekend.

KA

Thanks for your timely post, KA. Interesting stuff.

bumping for discussion of KA's point here:

Confirmations are performed for the deceased, usually a period of time after they've been baptized by proxy. Personally, I can see how confirmations for the dead may potentially be more offensive to non-Mormons than baptisms for the dead. Confirming a deceased person a member of the Mormon church implies that the deceased has indeed accepted his or her Mormon baptism. Temple ordinances for the dead follow the same assumption.

Genealogical work here is extremely inefficient and does not appear to be necessary as Kimberly points out. I agree that the proxy confirmation part should be more troublesome than the baptism as it actually places the corpse in the church. More troubling should be proxy sealing. If people are offended that we claim to change the church membership of their dead relatives how much more troubling should be our claims to remove their relatives from their families?

My goodness me. This is the first I have heard of confirmation for the dead.

And it has apparently been done for Mitt Romney's father-in-law, acknowledged to have been a determined sceptic about all organised religion, even if he was not perhaps an atheist:

See: http://gawker.com/5879888/yes-the-romne ... o-mormonis

For a proper LDS source, see bolded portion below: https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.2.1/SY4N-CL3

Pedigree Resource File

name: Edward Roderick /DAVIES/
gender: Male
birth: 2 Jun 1915
Maesteg,Glamorgan,Wales
death: 8 Sep 1992
Stuart,Martin,Florida
burial: White Chapel Cem,Troy,Oakland,Michigan
Parents
father: David Thomas /DAVIES/
mother: Ann /EVANS/
Marriages (1)
spouse: Lois /POTTINGER/
marriage: 15 Aug 1947
Farmington,Wayne,Michigan
Submission
submitter: ktripp1103487
submission date: 12 Sep 2006
submission id: MM7C-58G
person count: 9,718
Notes

RESEARCH-FOR-TRIM: Should this individual be deleted?

!BIRTH: Certificate of Birth; St. Catherines House; London, England !DEATH: Certificate of Death; State of Florida !ORDINANCE: IGI, US & Canada. All ordinances except sealing to spouse performed in Salt Lake Temple on 19 Nov 1993 in special family meeting.

Source Citation

"Pedigree Resource File," database, FamilySearch (http://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.2.1/SY4N-CL3 : accessed 4 March 2012), entry for Edward Roderick /DAVIES/.
Source Information

The Pedigree Resource File is a collection of lineage-linked names submitted by users of FamilySearch. The information displayed in the file includes the notes and sources in the submission. No merges, corrections, or additions are made to the data submitted to the Pedigree Resource File. Users can draw from this database for help with their family history research.

I think the reason that people focus on the baptism instead of the confirmation is because the confirmation ordinance is foreign whereas most people are familiar with baptism.

Fence Sitter wrote:Genealogical work here is extremely inefficient and does not appear to be necessary as Kimberly points out. I agree that the proxy confirmation part should be more troublesome than the baptism as it actually places the corpse in the church. More troubling should be proxy sealing. If people are offended that we claim to change the church membership of their dead relatives how much more troubling should be our claims to remove their relatives from their families?

Exactly. And I'd never really thought of this because of the emphasis placed on baptism of the dead.

Correct me if I'm wrong but marriage = sealing? There are no marriages arranged for the dead, just sealings of those already married in life, or sealings of singles together? Is the latter still practiced much? Are people sealing relatives (and others) to people they had no relationship to in life (i.e., Joseph Smith)?

Stormy Waters wrote:I think the reason that people focus on the baptism instead of the confirmation is because the confirmation ordinance is foreign whereas most people are familiar with baptism.

I think you're right.

Blixa wrote:
Correct me if I'm wrong but marriage = sealing? There are no marriages arranged for the dead, just sealings of those already married in life, or sealings of singles together? Is the latter still practiced much? Are people sealing relatives (and others) to people they had no relationship to in life (i.e., Joseph Smith)?

It has been a while since I have looked at current temple work so I may have the terminology wrong. But when we seal children to their parents and grandparents and so on back we are creating a family unit that by definition excludes those relatives that have not been sealed. So in order for one of those relatives to join that unit that relative would first have to be a member of the Church and then have themselves also sealed to the common ancestor.

Currently I believe the only people that are allowed to be sealed to non bloodline relatives (outside of course marriage) would be children that have been adopted.

What went on from 1840 to 1890ish is a totally different thing. There were no restrictions on who could be sealed to whom, live or dead other than permission from the Church authorities. It was the wild wild west of celestial family empire building back then. BY has a great quote about how some elders would seal themselves to the devil were they given the chance.

Fence Sitter wrote:
It has been a while since I have looked at current temple work so I may have the terminology wrong. But when we seal children to their parents and grandparents and so on back we are creating a family unit that by definition excludes those relatives that have not been sealed. So in order for one of those relatives to join that unit that relative would first have to be a member of the Church and then have themselves also sealed to the common ancestor.

Currently I believe the only people that are allowed to be sealed to non bloodline relatives (outside of course marriage) would be children that have been adopted.

What went on from 1840 to 1890ish is a totally different thing. There were no restrictions on who could be sealed to whom, live or dead other than permission from the Church authorities. It was the wild wild west of celestial family empire building back then. BY has a great quote about how some elders would seal themselves to the devil were they given the chance.

Thanks, that answers my questions and also clarifies your earlier point that such sealing does suggest that the persons in question are now part of a "new family," i.e:

More troubling should be proxy sealing. If people are offended that we claim to change the church membership of their dead relatives how much more troubling should be our claims to remove their relatives from their families?