Category: Temples
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Baptism for the Dead and 1 Corinthians 15:29
Baptism is one of the most central ordinances in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Faithful members of the church who are born in the covenant are usually baptized at age 8. Missionaries seek out potential converts who will be immersed in water in a special ordinance to enter into membership into Mormonism.…
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Moroni and LDS temples
The golden statue of an angel atop many Latter-day Saint temples, now widely recognized as Moroni—the angel who allegedly revealed the gold plates to Joseph Smith—first appeared as an unnamed figure on the Nauvoo Temple and evolved into a symbol of Moroni with the Salt Lake Temple in 1893, though its inclusion has waxed and…
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The LDS Temple Endowment Ceremony Changes Again: Mormonism’s Word of God Does Not Endure
The LDS Church has once again revised its sacred temple endowment ceremony, slashing twenty percent of the ritual in 2024 despite past leaders’ claims that it was divinely revealed by Joseph Smith to remain unchanged forever.
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Revised LDS Temple Endowment Ceremony Now Includes More Pictures of Jesus
21 February 2023 I love to see the temple.I’ll go inside someday.I’ll cov’nant with my Father;I’ll promise to obey. “I love to See the Temple” is a popular Primary song in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Kids as young as three years old sing about preparing themselves to attend an LDS temple…
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Rendezvousing With Spirits of the Dead
Note: The following was originally printed in the November/December 2022 edition of Mormonism Researched. To request a free subscription, please visit here. Most of the work done in the 170+ temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints located around the world is performed by faithful Mormons on behalf of those who are no longer…
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‘Uncomfortable’ and ‘Weird’ LDS Temple Ceremony
Hulu, the online streaming service, released a miniseries in April (2022) based on the real-life 1984 Utah murders of a mother and her toddler daughter. The miniseries, “Under the Banner of Heaven,” follows Jon Krakauer’s 2003 bestselling book of the same name as it explores Mormon fundamentalism and Mormonism’s sometimes violent history. I’ve been seeing…
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Mormonism’s Washington D.C. Temple Remains a Mystery
20 April 2022 On Easter Sunday (April 17, 2022) CBS Morning News Sunday Morning presented viewers with an exclusive look at The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ newly renovated Washington D.C. Temple. As a preview to the temple’s public open house scheduled for later this month, journalist Ed O’Keefe was given a tour…
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Does Temple Participation Offer “Assurance”?
Posted October 7, 2021 Note: The following was originally printed in the September/October 2021 edition of the Mormonism Researched, a bimonthly periodical of MRM that is free upon request. To request a free subscription to Mormonism Researched, please visit here. Speaking at general conference on April 3, 2021, Henry B. Eyring, second counselor to 17th President Russell…
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The Temple Endowment Ceremony
Participation in what is called the temple “endowment” ceremony is an important facet of the LDS faith since it is in this ritual where Mormons learn secret “key words,” “signs” and “tokens” that they hope will help them return to God’s presence. Brigham Young, Mormonism’s second president, claimed, “Your endowment is, to receive all those ordinances…
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10 Reasons why the Multiple LDS Temples Have Nothing to do with the Biblical Temple in Jerusalem
Check out Viewpoint on Mormonism’s 10-part series on the temple that originally aired from July 26-30, 2021: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Many Mormons assume that the temples built and operated by their church are based on biblical precedent, as per the teachings of their leaders. For instance, Apostle Mark…
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Temple Recommend Questions Revised–A Closer Look at the Changes
In the closing talk at the October 2019 General Conference, President Russell M. Nelson—the architect of a number of changes during his run of his presidency beginning in 2018—announced that there would be revisions to most of the temple interview questions asked of those who are applying for admittance into the more than 160 temples…
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Crash Course Mormonism: Temples
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches that work must be done by members in one of its hundreds of temples temples located throughout the world in order to qualify for exaltation, also known as eternal life, in the celestial kingdom. Special rites are accomplished for not only the living person but also…
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An Imaginary Tour of the LDS Temple in Rome
18 March 2019 On March 7th (2019) the Newsroom of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints posted what it called an “unprecedented video production within one of the Church’s most sacred spaces.” This video is a virtual tour of the church’s new temple in Rome, Italy. Led by two Mormon apostles, David Bednar and…
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Masonry and the Mormon Temple Endowment Ceremony
Earlier this month The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints posted a new essay to the Church History Topics section of its website. In the church’s continuing effort to be more “transparent” about its past, the new essay, titled “Masonry,” examines the relationship between the LDS temple endowment ceremony and Masonic ritual. The essay…
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The Continuing Adjustments to Mormonism
7 January 2019 The media is reporting on a significant Mormon-related matter. On January 1st The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints introduced changes to its temple endowment ceremony. While not unheard of, temple changes are somewhat uncommon, the last noteworthy changes having occurred in 2005. Most of the recent changes to the ceremony are,…
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Citations on the Temple
The following are sections out of Bill McKeever’s book In their Own Words: A Collection of Mormon Quotations. The full book of 400 pages is available at Mormonism Research Ministry or Amazon.com. Standard Works “And this I know, because the Lord hath said he dwelleth not in unholy temples, but in the hearts of the righteous doth he dwell”…
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Citations on Baptism for the Dead
The following are sections out of Bill McKeever’s book In their Own Words: A Collection of Mormon Quotations. The full book of 400 pages is available at Mormonism Research Ministry or Amazon.com. Standard Works “And again, in connection with this quotation I will give you a quotation from one of the prophets, who had his eye fixed on the…
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Mormon Endowment Ceremony Origins
One hundred eighty years ago this month (June 2017) W.A. Cowdery, the Mormon editor of the Latter Day Saints’ Messenger and Advocate, told readers about ancient Greece. He explained, “The history of Greece for a period of three hundred years preceding the Trojan war, is intermixed with fables; but contains, notwithstanding, many facts entitled to…
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(Short) Answers to the 10 Most Common Responses I Get at Temple Open House Outreaches
Since 1993, MRM has participated in dozens of temple open house events, which is the only time when those without Mormon temple recommends are allowed to go inside a new or rededicated LDS temple and see what it looks like inside. We have found that, in recent years, more than 90% of those attending appear to…
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Is Baptism for the Dead a Biblical Doctrine?
The Bible and the Book of Mormon are in agreement when they proclaim that there are no second chances for salvation. For example, 2 Corinthians 6:2 says, “Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” Hebrews 9:27 adds, “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.” In…