Reply #59: Temple Ritual Chronology-no real secrets revealed

[insanad]

The chronology of a typical temple endowment and sealing session goes mostly like this...(the ladies experience)


You enter the temple (after going through the process of getting a recommend) and there are greeters who direct you to a rental station where you can rent a temple gown and the various things you will wear during the ceremony if you don't have your own stuff. The price is fairly cheap but plan to spend about $6.00 per person

Then you go through another door where theres another greeter who directs you to the changing room. This is a huge locker room(ever wonder why they need locks in the temple?) and you get a locker and change into this nightgown thing and hang up your clothes in the locker.

You take this little cloth bag called a packet which has a funky veil like hat, a green silk or satin apron with fig leaves on it, and a sort of strange shawl robe thing that you'll wear over the nightgown but you'll switch it back and forth from one side to the other for some ritual things.

If this is your first time you'll be taken to a little booth where someone will tell you some ritual stuff that is supposed to set you apart for "washing and annointing", and then (they used to actually touch your private parts and bosom under this thing they called a shield but was really just a big cape thingy) they will touch near your body in symbolic representation of whatever it is it's supposed to represent. I can't remember what it was about but I remember being very creeped out.

Then you'll go through this line and a little old lady will ask you some questions to which you answer yes or no and then another old lady takes you into this little booth where she whispers a secret name to you. You repeat what she says word for word and they correct you if you mess up, so just repeat it till you get it right. Don't worry if you forget it, everyone gets the same secret name that day. It's supposed to be your new name when you go to heaven and your spouse is the only one who can call it to have you resurrected. If he doesn't call your name, you stay dead. (cool eh???)

Then you go down a long hallway to the endowment ceremony room. This is usually a big room like a chapel. It's decorated very nicely with soft comfy chairs in long rows. The women sit on one side and the men on the other. Up front is an altar and a movie screen. The walls are usually painted with scenes from biblical legends like the Garden of Eden or what have you. Some are better than others but it gives you something to look at while you are waiting.

The endowment ceremony is done by men who are usually quite old and have the most boring voices in the world. I'm pretty sure that's the pre-requisite for the job. They lecture on some ritual stuff, all of it memorized and repeated word for word and then they start the movie.

The movie is about the creation of the earth and Christ's role, Satan, and Michael who apparantly becomes Adam. Part way through the movie the lights will come on and you'll go through some strange ritual things but they're not terribly creepy, just odd. Then the movie continues and goes through the garden of eden stuff till Adam and Eve get cast out.
The lights come back on (this usually wakes everyone up) and you do some more rituals, changing the costume from right to left, putting on the veil, etc.. A few old ladies come and do some hand symbols to you and you have to touch their palms, wrists, and such. They used to have you make death symbols but apparantly they don't do that anymore.Mostly it's just weird but not like sacrificing babies or snake handling or anything, just weird.

Then an old man has a few couples, usually the ones getting married, and others who want to participate come up and stand in a circle with one arm on each others back, and the other held up like you're about to ask a question (to the square). He rambles for a while and then starts this prayer of which the people in the circle must repeat it word for word. Sometimes these old geezers love the podium and can really ramble so the prayers can go on and on.

Then when the endowment session is done you go into another room that is supposed to represent the veil between heaven and the afterlife waiting station of the spirit world. When it's your turn to go up you go up to a white nylon curtain with some funky little v shaped holes in it. Behind it is an old man who says some ritual things to you and you have to repeat them word for word. There's an old lady standing next to you to make sure you say everything word for word. Then he takes your hand and places his hand on your back through the v cuts in the curtain. You say the words and your new name and then he guides you through the veil, (curtain) and you go into what is called the Celestial Room.

The Celestial Rooms are very very pretty and elegant and brightly lit. They have soft chairs and pretty silk flowers and every kind of luxurious carpet and wallcovering. You sit there in some kind of contemplation, apparantly overwhelmed and spiritually moved by the previous two hrs. experiences. If you're not getting married or sealed for someone else then eventually you can leave, but many like to stay long enough to recieve some revelation about something in their lives or personal situations. This is where lots of folks get the inspiration of who to marry, what job to take, etc.. (be careful though, someone else may not get the same revelation you got and so then it's a battle of who'se is more valid and sanctioned by God)

If you're getting married for the first time then you go to a sealing room which is precious and small and very nicely decorated. They have mirrors on all the walls and an altar in the middle with padded knee stands.

Following is my wedding experience, but doesn't necessarily represent what everyone feels.

I'm so glad I'm not the only one that thinks the Temple rituals and experience are absolutely horrifying and bizarre. I was pregnant with my son when I was socially forced to marry my husband (ex) 26 years ago. Even though I didn't love him, we had serious problems, fought continually, and were really really sorely matched I was pressured to go through the temple after we had been married a year. I had no real idea what the rituals were like, the costumes and endowments, etc.. I'd seen the garments and always thought they must come yellowed and skanky since I'd never seen anyone wearing anything resembling new white ones.

From the moment I entered to the last panicked second we left I was overcome with a horrible sense of dread. I could hardly breathe in there and my nerves stood on end as the washing and annointing ritual was performed, the new name given (which at the time I hated and would not reveal to my husband when he was commanded to call me by it), the hand symbols and freaky death signs, the creepy touch of old ladies I didn't know and the weird complacent and nearly trancelike expressions of the people in the endowments. The prayer circle was just like something out of a Dungeons and Dragons game and I just stood there watching these people recite the ramblings of this geezer who was all puffed up in his pulpit and the way people would do his bidding. The whole movie thing was so strange and badly done that I just couldn't take any part of it seriously or consider it a spiritual experience. Once we started that whole veil thing I was ready to run and it was all I could do to not rip the frumpy synthetic nightgown and apron off and just scream.

My mom could sense my horrible anxiety and kept patting my hand and telling me I'd get used to it if I just kept going. Crikey, what kind of church can make up such freaky stuff and then use guilt and social pressure to make you continue to go? I began to leave the church when I was about nine years old, but that was one of the defining moments for my revulsion for the LDS church doctrine and practices.

When my ex and I got sealed it was just one of those run of the mill, process them through quickly, McMormon wedding sealing ceremonies that was about as personal as an automatic car wash. The only memorable part was when our infant son puked on the Temple President and stained his fancy white suit with the orange stain of baby formula. It was sort of surreal since my son had projectile vomiting and any jostling after eating would stir a stream that would make the Exorcist vomit scene look tame. As this guy, (I don't recall his name because he was a complete stranger and never had any impact or significance in our lives before or since) was lecturing us he picked up our really cute 4 month old smiling son and held him over his head. My son let out a belch and then a stream of curdled stinking formula that nearly melted the fancy carpet.That was how I remember my temple marriage, suffocating pressure, bizarre rituals, creepy touching, and vomit. Mom was wrong, I never did get used to it no matter how many times I went back or how many prayer circles were devoted on my behalf.

Temple Aprons
They're to represent the fig leaves that Adam and Eve wore and Yes, I do believe they originated with the Masons but I think even Jews and other religions with Adam and Eve backgrounds use them. The ones they use in the temple are very pretty emerald green and embroidered with a large sort of ivy leaf pattern. That was one part of the get-up I actually thought was interesting and pretty. I used to sneak candy in the sleeve of my dress and I secretly sewed a pocket in the backside of my apron to hold jolly ranchers and lifesavers or other candy that I'd pre-unwrapped so the celophane wouldn't cause any dirty looks by the ladies. The sessions are sooooo long and sooooo boring. I think the second the lights went out for the creation movie the whole place would be snoring in a pentamic rythm, much like the singsongy rythms of the testimony recitations. Up, down, up, down, nameajeesechristnamen. It's those nap times where I think most temple "Revelations" come about. Deep REM, or the frequently interrupted short naps can cause all kinds of hallucinations, even the ones where you think someone is supposed to marry you or squeeze off another kid for your posterior or something. Basing a whole life change or scripture on such brain activity seems pretty silly. Following someone who thinks THEIR dreams are the same as the WORD OF GOD ON YOUR BEHALF is even sillier.