When Did LDS Leaders Change the Law of Chastity?

[_kamenraider]

I think "sexual intercourse" was changed to "sexual relations" so that people didn't think that sexual involvement short of intercourse was not breaking this covenant. The phrase "with any of the opposite sex" was removed because same-sex attraction has come to the attention of Church leaders more and more. Another removal: "wife or wives" -- no need for that now, they must've thought. Yet another removed phrase: "who are given you by the holy priesthood" -- it's evidently seen as politically incorrect nowadays to suggest that wives are "given," especially by an all-male priesthood. The addition of the word "legally" I think was meant to emphasize the determination of Church leaders to see that the "law of the land" is abided by, in addition to just the laws of God, which might be construed by some to still constitute a "lawful" marriage.

[_zeezrom]

I'm going to throw out a guess or two. I'm going to say it was around 1890 church leaders started to discuss the topic (due to pressures from the Feds). Then there was a quiet time until around the 1910's, when the leaders started to fear the changes in women's fashion and decided that members needed to be reminded of their roles and restrictions. The leaders probably felt that it was about time to let polygamy go for good around the late 1920's.

Just a guess but I'm going to say that the LofCH probably changed around the time of the stock market crash.

[_zeezrom]

The year of Magaret Sanger's dream about the magic pill?

[_zeezrom]

It might be a stretch, but I currently feel birth control is related to the words of LDS prophets concerning "sexual purity."

only condones the evil of those who are guilty of this mockery, but admits them freely in the charmed circle of society. It repels with high disdain the poor Magdalene whom the Savior himself pardoned, but it honors with special friendship the Herods and their consorts. It us high time for society to outlaw such sacreligious profaners and offenders to Christian decency. " The pagans of old cast their infants from the Tarpeian rock, immolated them before the idol of Molock, but they had not learned the refinement of crime to which their modern devotees are addicted -- birth control. There are women who profess to be Christians who are forever going about poisoning the minds and hearts of every young bride they can reach with the venom of their hell-flamed tongues, advising them to forestall the laws of nature and nature's God by preventing the conception, and birth and the rearing of children. Oh, Herod, Herod! what a tyro you were. The modern husband and wife have put you to shame in the damning sin of the' slaughter of the innocents'. Heber C Iverson, 1920