“Well, uh—” was all I got out. I don’t think he really wanted me to say more. This was his chance to shine, his own sermon he was expecting us to listen to with rapt attention. I felt that discomfort I sometimes feel when I attend other Christian worship services, where there are so many notes that are exactly what I think, mixed in with things I don’t like at all or even find rather offensive, like the curse of Eve or celibacy for priests.
“Women were scrubbed out of the Book of Mormon,” Stephen continued, “ever since Heber J. Grant worked to spread the missionary work worldwide. He felt that all references to polygamy in our own past and in our doctrine had to be wiped away and he did his best to convince converts and lifelong Mormons that the LDS church is simply another Christianity, rather than a radical return to the old practices of Judaism.”
I couldn’t help but glance at Rebecca, who was staring at her husband with awe, like the man she knew as a mortal had become rather more than that in an inspired speech. I’d had a couple of moments like that with Kurt, I admit, although maybe not as many as he would have liked since he became bishop.
Stephen continued, “When an angel came with a sword of destruction and threatened Joseph’s life if he did not begin to practice polygamy in 1839, it had to come three times over a period of months before he listened. He waited as long as he possibly could before he spoke to Emma about what God had revealed to him.
“And then when Emma would not listen, Joseph had no choice but to begin to seek out those women whom God had reserved for him to be sealed to. Emma’s reluctance meant that he no longer had to ask for her permission, but it also taught him that he had to keep this most sacred of all parts of Mormonism secret because the agents of Satan would try to destroy him even as he showed those who were willing to hear from him how to become gods.”
Becoming gods in the celestial kingdom wasn’t something Mormons talked about much anymore, though it had certainly been part of polygamy and there were remnants of this belief in the temple ceremony. You had to promise some pretty hefty rewards, in my opinion, to get people to do something so inherently difficult.
“One of the women Joseph married was Eliza R. Snow, the great poetess and future president of the Relief Society. But it was only recently revealed by the historian Andrea Radke-Moss that Eliza had been gang-raped by enemies of the church, and injured in a way that meant she would never be able to have children. Marrying her and other stalwart women like her was a way for Joseph to show them that God still loved them and that they would not be left out of the promises of the temple sealing in the eternities. She might never have her own increase, but she could share with her sister wives in theirs. And when Joseph died, Brigham Young stood in and took his place, giving Eliza his name and his honor and protection for the rest of her days. How could anyone argue that such a use of polygamy was wrong or in any way sexually motivated?”
Though I didn’t trust everything Stephen said, I felt something within me stir at this explanation of Eliza Snow, who had been a great Mormon poet and leader of women. Her beautiful song “O My Father” was one of my favorites and I had always wondered why, when she disagreed with him so often, she had married Brigham Young. For a moment, I found myself nodding with Stephen Carter, agreeing with him that at least for Eliza, polygamy might have made sense.
Then I shook myself. I’d better be more careful listening to Stephen Carter’s incantatory storytelling or I was going to end up thinking Kurt and I should start looking around for another wife. Stephen Carter was so charismatic that I could see how I could be taken in, despite disagreeing so strongly with him.
“In 1841, after Emma had refused to embrace the doctrine of celestial marriage, Joseph led another woman to the temple and was sealed to her first. Can you imagine how that made him feel? The woman he had fallen in love with as a young man, the woman he had gone through so much sorrow with, had shared his children’s births and deaths with, was not with him on that most important day of his life?” asked Stephen.
I had always imagined it from Emma’s perspective. Had Joseph told her coldly what he was planning to do that day? Had she argued with him? Threatened to leave him? Had he done it secretly, furtively? Had she found out the truth from the other woman, now sealed to Joseph for time and all eternities while Emma was his in this life only?