Why does the church deny agency?

[_LDSToronto]

Just Me, women can choose to cancel a sealing - it happens all the time when a divorce occurs. I'm unaware of many women who choose to remain sealed after divorce.

Unless you mean something different?

H.

Getting a legal divorce does not officially cancel the sealing. Women have their request for sealing cancellation denied all the time. There are women I know personally and online who have been denied sealing cancellation. The church typically does not approve of a sealing cancellation for a woman unless she has a temple ready man waiting in the wings.
Men are allowed to get sealed over and over again without cancelling the previous sealing. This means there are cases where 3 or 4 living women are sealed to a living man.

It is insulting that a woman cannot have her sealing cancelled unless she has a temple ready man waiting to marry her.

I'm no defender of the LDS church, Just Me, but I have served in a position where I have seen sealing cancellation requests, by women. I have never seen a cancellation denied, for any woman who requested it.

As for automatically cancelling a sealing when a divorce occurs, that is dicey. There may be cases when women want to remain sealed to their ex-husband.

Anyways, I'm not defending or refuting, just sharing my experience.

H.

[_just me]

Thank you for sharing your experience. I am glad to hear that in some areas cancellations are routinely granted. I guess it is a problem if it is left up to local leadership.
I know my aunt had to appeal to the top to get hers done...the whole ordeal took years.

It has been the experience of those I know online and in real life that unless there is a temple ready man wanting to get sealed to her the answer is no.

I'm curious to know if the majority of the sealing cancellations you were aware of were because the woman was getting remarried in the temple.

[_The Nehor]

Wow, everything about this post is wrong. Pretty impressive.

Choices that are involuntary because they have been compelled by coercion are not free.

Are you suggesting that most temple marriages are entered into under duress?

When the range of choices you are capable of making is restricted, the scope of your free will has decreased.

No, it hasn't. Your freedom maybe but not your free will.

I think this is relevant every time someone tries to defend an action or theological point that coerces or restricts choice by saying, "Well, free agency doesn't mean making choices free of consequences."

True, if a bit simplistic.

But the free will defense as applied to the problem of evil, often employed by the very same people doing the above, requires there to be an overarching good that demands choices go unrestricted. That's because it is a justification for why God isn't coercing people into the "right" choices. These don't fit comfortably side by side.

But they do.

[_The Nehor]

I still don't understand why men are allowed to get sealed to 2+ women and none of those women are allowed to get their sealing cancelled. She is, in effect, being forced into eternal polygamy and an earthly polygamous sealing.

Forced? Not a chance. If either side doesn't live up to their covenants then the promises binding them are void.

There are real women who are very upset by this. They are living it and it makes it hard for them to move on. I think it effects women who remain believers much more than women who stop believing. Part of getting closure can be feeling that all ties to the person have been severed.

Then think harder before getting married.

Why is that right denied?

Annulling covenants with God is not a right.

What the hell is the point of saying that we are "free to choose" when we really aren't?

If you want the weasel room to back out of a covenant DON'T MAKE THE COVENANT.

If the truth is that we "give up our agency" when we join the church then maybe we shouldn't be baptizing little children. Maybe we should be sure people are told that and understand that before they go to the temple at such young ages.

They are.

So, since the church doesn't believe that agency is part of the Plan O' Salvation then maybe they should stop giving it lip service.

Again, no understanding of what agency is. Sigh.

NEHOR, if a women will not be stuck with an abusive spouse in eternity why must she be refused in this life?

She's not. Get a divorce. But the covenants you made with God on your sealing day are still valid even if the marriage is not (for time or eternity). Those covenants are still a protection and a blessing. Losing them could damn you.

Why does God allow a woman more choice than the modern church?

God is not giving a choice. It's whether the covenants the two people FREELY CHOSE TO MAKE are obeyed. If they are not then the covenant is broken and it is null and void in any case.

[_just me]

Actually, no, when I was getting ready to get married I was never told that I was giving up my agency. When I was a little 8 year old child I was never told that I was giving up my agency.

I was never told what covenants I would be making at my endowment or my temple sealing. Even today I can't even get people to talk to me about what EXACTLY was promised in my temple marriage ceremony or the endowment. Near I can tell it is simply a catchall "covenant" to do anything and everything the church ever asks you to.

That is a bunch of bullship.

Think harder before getting married. Well, I'm sorry, I was in love and wanted to have some church sanctioned sex. If that isn't under duress, I'm not sure what is. ;)
Oh, and I prayed about it and got a burning in my bosom.

[_Buffalo]

Question: if the woman resigns from the church, is her sealing cancelled? How could a man be sealed to a non-member?

She could get re-baptized after the sealings get cancelled upon resignation. After re-baptism, she could get sealed to the guy she wants... Would that work?

Yes, resignation cancels sealings, but in a different way...

If she rejoined, it's not so simple. A re-admission means you have your blessings restored. You don't get re-endowed, re-sealed, etc. You simply get a 'restoration of blessings' blessing and that restores everything back to the way it was.

H.

Just like magic!