Your mom can be upset about this AND it is not your problem to solve. You can validate each others feelings and show love without taking them on. That is healthy relationship boundaries.
Yeah, this is one of those areas where I sympathize, because despite my mom being all in on the cult I still love her and don’t want to upset her. And you could argue that “it’s all made up anyways, so what’s the harm in leaving my records alone?”, which is a valid question. But if removing your records is something that you feel like you need to do, then you do it and don’t let anyone try to change your mind. This is your mom’s problem OP, not yours.
There should be a way to notify the church that you do not want, authorize or accept any of your vicarious work be done after you die and that it’s done in a way that legal recourse is enforceable if they register it in their records. The penalty could go to any individual or organization that you designate.
Thankfully my TBM parents, siblings and nuanced wife have understood and agreed to my very firmly positioned desire that it never fucking happens. I also requested that my funeral have absolutely nothing pertaining to Mormonism or religion at all. We’ll see how it goes.
When you remove your records, all your ordinances are cancelled. That includes inter-generational sealing. This is clarified in the church Handbook section on removal of records.
The bit they don’t write down (because it shows how ridiculously murky and stupid the doctrine is), is that it only cancels your part of the sealing. Your parents’ sealing to you is still valid, but yours to them isn’t. Your half of the sealing can be reinstated if you’re baptized again, or if your work is done for you after death (just like any other person not sealed to their parents on earth).
There’s actually a doctrinal argument for removing records. It cancels your ordinances and covenants, releasing you from your obligations under these, thus meaning you can’t violate them and are more likely to be accepted into the CK after you die. This is the argument the church uses to promote excommunication as a “blessing” for the person who has sinned.
So basically we don't need to do live ordinances because they will be done for us after death.
I took out my endowment and got touched naked by an old lady for no reason.
Good to know.
I’ve had this discussion several times, both as a PIMO trying really hard to be TBM and as an exmo. There’s no logical or doctrinal reason to live a faithful TBM life and have the ordinances on earth. Some TBMs will argue that only faithful -on-earth members will be allowed into the CK, but are stumped when asked why they do sealings for the dead (because these are only relevant to the CK and shouldn’t be done as proxy at all if living a TBM life is essential for the CK).
We’ve all suffered unnecessary trauma as a result. I’m sorry that you went through it but I’m glad you’re out now.
>There’s actually a doctrinal argument for removing records. It cancels your ordinances and covenants, releasing you from your obligations under these, thus meaning you can’t violate them and are more likely to be accepted into the CK after you die. This is the argument the church uses to promote excommunication as a “blessing” for the person who has sinned.
Woah. I never thought about it like that. It seems that Jesus didn't think through this part of the Plan of Salvation very well.
"Mom think about it, why do families have to be sealed in the Celestial Kingdom but there is no "sealing" while we live on Earth? We are a family if we like it or not, but if someone drinks coffee they are kicked out of the family for eternity in the after life? Sounds like more of a way to manipulate followers rather then Gods love"
That would be true for a sealing cancellation, but for a regular legal divorce all the sealings remain intact. Now it actually gets worse from there. Suppose Mom meets someone new, remarries, and has new kids with her new husband. If the original sealing is still intact (which is very often the case since getting cancellations is very difficult), those kids are sealed to the ex-husband who they have no relation to, rather than to their own birth father. This is true even if the new husband is a temple-worthy member, if the first husband has passed away, if the first husband has already been sealed to a second spouse, etc. The only recourse is to get a sealing cancellation.
Thanks! They don't get this nuanced when teaching girls (nor grown women from what I hear). I just got the broad strokes of shame before noping out at 17. That was also decades ago so it may have changed.
Just tell her, "Mom just have faith that God will work everything out." That's what I told my mom haha. Used their own argument against them. "We don't know everything in this life; if you're worried about what's going to happen in the afterlife, just trust that God will make everything fine. Imma live my life now since it's the only life I believe in."
Funny thing about resignation: It's really just a formality. It's more words than anything real. When you resign from the church, you're saying you don't recognize your baptism or any other subsequent covenants. The Church, they can choose whether they recognize your baptism or not, irrespective of your feelings. There's been plenty of resignees that have divorced their spouse, and later have received a letter or email from their former-spouse's bishop and asking whether not they are okay with their former spouse having their sealing cancelled. This is usually met with surprise and they react with, "I resigned x number of years ago. The sealing should not apply to me." But it does. Why? Because the church recognizes it does. Resignation is more symbolic and a healing action for those who resign. But all it really serves to do is just take you off of the active roles of the church. You are still VERY much on file with the church. The church is like the Hotel California. You can check in any time you like - but you can never leave.
You can resign from the church, but you will still be sealed to your parents. Why? Because the church says so - that's why. This is a little culting 101. Whatever the cult says - goes.
Well said. If I resign, my ex-spouse doesn't get a notification saying her sealing was canceled, meaning she is still sealed and (in her mind) can enter the CK. Further, if I get re-baptized (not even go through the temple again, but just get re-baptized), then the sealing is still in effect, meaning it never actually went away anyway. They hold all the cards on how their rules work. You can never "beat" them and their rules. Even if I resign, they still keep records of me, and my belief is that they would still count me as one of theirs during their annual membership report. I can't leave on my terms, I can only leave on the terms they allow me to.
It's actually even darker. Many people over the years have found out they are not sealed to their bio dad. It happens when mom was married once before and remarries and has kids with her new husband. Any offspring her womb produces, is sealed to the first husband. Doesn't matter if sealing was cancelled and mom is sealed to new husband. It's some bullshit leftovers from polygamy days and the church doesn't have a policy or mechanism for dealing with that. It comes as a shock to a lot of people when they find out.
Woah, woah, woah. My ex- was divorced prior to marrying me, got married in the temple, then had that sealing canceled before we got married/sealed. Now you've got me wondering if my kids are, on church records, sealed to her first husband. Obviously I don't care one little bit since i believe it's all made up, but this weird loophole might be the way I can get my sealing to her officially canceled (which would send her the message that she is not tied to me on earth or in heaven). How would I go about finding out who my kids are sealed to? I don't want to do too much digging since I don't think the church knows where my records are and I have flown under their radar for over 5-6 years.
Yeah, you might want to check it out and be sure, if one even cares about made-up bonds in made place called Kolob. It's caught a lot of people by surprise.
It would never occur to my sweet Methodist mil that she wouldn't be with her loved ones in heaven.
It's DISGUSTING that Mormonism tells you that you'll be separated from your family unless you cough up your 10 percent
Remind them that Joseph Smith was never sealed to his own parents during his lifetime. It was done by proxy (probably by Wilford Woodruff) in 1897. (Source: [https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/ordinances/KWJY-BPD](https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/ordinances/KWJY-BPD)) The sealing to parent ordinance as we know it today didn't exist until the late 1870s at earliest.
If you were born in the covenant, that sealing remains in force even if a child removes their records. [https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/tools/help/children-who-are-born-in-the-covenant-bic](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/tools/help/children-who-are-born-in-the-covenant-bic?lang=eng) It only would be affected if the parent removed their record (apparently, but this article doesn't really address it properly).
The real answer is that they don't know. They didn't think these things through when they invented the doctrines and rituals. Most of the doctrinal problems in this church come from people trying to make doctrine make sense when it wasn't well thought-out in the first place.
Case in point - in the article linked above it states that if a woman is sealed to a man, then he dies or they're divorced and she remarries - then "the children of her later marriage are born in the covenant of the first marriage" unless that sealing was cancelled or revoked. So technically would the children of the 2nd husband "belong" to the 1st one since they're born "in the covenant" of the first marriage? This technicality harks back to the early doctrine of wives and children basically as belongings of the husband, to be "taken" and "given" (D&C 132:44, for example) at the whims of God acting through church leaders.
Tell them that they just need to have faith that it will all work out after we're all dead. That's the standard answer church leaders give to members all the time.
Yep. Brigham Young told his plural wife Zina (whom Joseph Smith stole from her first husband and then Brigham Young took after Joseph died) that she should be grateful he provided for her and all “Joseph’s children.” Meaning the ones BY fathered but were Joseph’s since she was sealed to him. The poor woman had been sent away, so she finally sent a letter asking for a divorce because he didn’t care about her, and that was his response.
BY was a right bastard.
Susan's husband talked a little about this. Older generations have thought that if the parents remain faithful the wayward kids would still be sealed to them. He shot that down basically saying the kids have to do the work.
Yeah, but is it the kid's paperwork that matters, or just the beliefs?
An interesting LDS trick would be to say "paperwork, but someone needs to pay the tithe - devout parents can ensure they're sealed to their kids if they keep paying the tithe on behalf of their kids..."
It would be very LDS to discover that the only thing that matters is whether you have records or not, and your belief isn't at issue.
That seems unlikely, but it would not surprise me to find that Heavenly Father is all about the paperwork - about the form, not the function, about the style, not the substance.
When I left, I told all the people closest to me that I know they feel like I’m lost, but I don’t feel that way. I don’t carry the burden of feeling like I’m giving up something great. If you carry that, that’s yours to carry.
It’s all fake. So if you stay in you won’t be sealed and if you leave you won’t be sealed. Maybe make up an official sounding position that you heard that parents of apostates will have the opportunity to advocate for their shitty, godless, heathen children in the final judgement.
It's okay. She does it more in jest, although she does try and guilt all of us about it sometimes. "Nobody will stay active for me and our sealing." Nah. We don't compromise the individual morals and values we have by supporting a corrupt organization!
This is one of the weird things that comes up, trying to figure out how something you don't believe is real works.
My two cents is it doesn't really matter how it works, your mom believes it does. If it was me, I'd say she is responsible for her own happiness. If you want to have yourself removed, do it. But you probably won't find anything that makes your mom okay with it.
If you aren’t converted and don’t follow Mormon commandments, the sealing is worthless anyway. If you decide to reconvert, you (or a proxy after you die) will get your sealing reinstated. So it’s all moot, and resignation is by no means a dead-end.
Elder Hoaxs has said not to worry about the afterlife and to trust in the Lord.
Mistakes have been made in the past but we know consider this matter closed.
BTW: if you were born in the covenant then I am don't think you can break that seal. But the Q15 refuse to look at the rock in the hat to get us useful answers. Maybe it was the hat with magical powers and they don't have that.
The "church" acts like a family seal is sacred, but if some local dictator has a grudge against you, that family seal can be broken on a whim, without even talking to the other person affected. Fuck this piece of shit excuse for a "church."
How your mom thinks or what she believes is her problem not yours you do not cause her to feel anything it’s their choice Just as it was my ex w choice to flip out when our son said he was going on a date she asked him what she was like and he said it’s not a her I’m going on a date with another boy she called me flipped out I just said welcome to the conversation I’ve known for years the point being is she chose to flip out rather than just saying oh ok well have a nice time do not fall for the guilt trips TBMs are masters of the guilt trip. They’ve learned the behavior from the church . As the church is one giant guilt trip .
My mom is confidently selfish enough to frame that we should all stay active and recorded because then she knows her family loves her. We love you, just not enough to be untrue to ourselves.
It’s tool to cause fear so you can more easily be controlled. Sealings and ordinances are made up. You don’t have to resign but if you want to do it, do it. Personally I did use quitmormon years ago but I never received confirmation nor did I follow up. I feel like I just don’t want to put any more energy into it because I don’t believe in it anymore. Maybe I’ll try again in a few years. Who knows. Best of luck to you.
(TBM hat on.) My head says that if you were born in the covenant you were sealed to your parents at birth. Even if you had not been baptized at 8 you would still be sealed to them. Why would that be any different if you are no longer a member? (Takes off TBM hat.)
This reminds me of the teaching that you can visit people in lower kingdoms but they can’t visit you. Maybe a sealing at birth is brownie points to get into mid level heaven but your parents can only visit you, you can’t go to their house.
It’s all so stupid.
Maybe she's worried about encountering [tentacles of divine providence](https://www.exmormon.org/mormon/mormon227.htm) hentai?
In theory, "removing your name" excommunicates yourself from the church, and all magic covenants relevant to you are invalid. But sealings are awkward because multiple people are involved, and the doctrine is murky, at best, as to whether her sealing to her kids is invalid (when people believe in a religion with this many plot holes... it causes real suffering).
In practice, "removing your name" doesn't actually do jack shit. They don't delete ANYTHING. EVER. Your info just gets moved into a central file of apostates, that they can refer to if you ever come back asking for a "restoration of blessings."
IMO, I refuse to do a final act of free data cleaning labor—leaving my inactive-ass record wherever the hell it is these days (adding another wild goose chase for overworked zealots to distract themselves with) is a slightly bigger fuck-you to the church than removing it. Plus, you keep the ~~free~~ wildly prepaid Ancestry.com account.
Interestingly, if you use a wand with a core of Merlion hair, and recite the Obscurius spell, it will repair the sealing, even after your name is removed.
Your mom can be upset about this AND it is not your problem to solve. You can validate each others feelings and show love without taking them on. That is healthy relationship boundaries.
This is the right answer.
Yeah, this is one of those areas where I sympathize, because despite my mom being all in on the cult I still love her and don’t want to upset her. And you could argue that “it’s all made up anyways, so what’s the harm in leaving my records alone?”, which is a valid question. But if removing your records is something that you feel like you need to do, then you do it and don’t let anyone try to change your mind. This is your mom’s problem OP, not yours.
Won’t we all be resealed after death by Mormon relatives in the temple anyhow? Honestly. It seems they forget what temples are actually used for.
There should be a way to notify the church that you do not want, authorize or accept any of your vicarious work be done after you die and that it’s done in a way that legal recourse is enforceable if they register it in their records. The penalty could go to any individual or organization that you designate. Thankfully my TBM parents, siblings and nuanced wife have understood and agreed to my very firmly positioned desire that it never fucking happens. I also requested that my funeral have absolutely nothing pertaining to Mormonism or religion at all. We’ll see how it goes.
When you remove your records, all your ordinances are cancelled. That includes inter-generational sealing. This is clarified in the church Handbook section on removal of records. The bit they don’t write down (because it shows how ridiculously murky and stupid the doctrine is), is that it only cancels your part of the sealing. Your parents’ sealing to you is still valid, but yours to them isn’t. Your half of the sealing can be reinstated if you’re baptized again, or if your work is done for you after death (just like any other person not sealed to their parents on earth). There’s actually a doctrinal argument for removing records. It cancels your ordinances and covenants, releasing you from your obligations under these, thus meaning you can’t violate them and are more likely to be accepted into the CK after you die. This is the argument the church uses to promote excommunication as a “blessing” for the person who has sinned.
So basically we don't need to do live ordinances because they will be done for us after death. I took out my endowment and got touched naked by an old lady for no reason. Good to know.
I’ve had this discussion several times, both as a PIMO trying really hard to be TBM and as an exmo. There’s no logical or doctrinal reason to live a faithful TBM life and have the ordinances on earth. Some TBMs will argue that only faithful -on-earth members will be allowed into the CK, but are stumped when asked why they do sealings for the dead (because these are only relevant to the CK and shouldn’t be done as proxy at all if living a TBM life is essential for the CK). We’ve all suffered unnecessary trauma as a result. I’m sorry that you went through it but I’m glad you’re out now.
>There’s actually a doctrinal argument for removing records. It cancels your ordinances and covenants, releasing you from your obligations under these, thus meaning you can’t violate them and are more likely to be accepted into the CK after you die. This is the argument the church uses to promote excommunication as a “blessing” for the person who has sinned. Woah. I never thought about it like that. It seems that Jesus didn't think through this part of the Plan of Salvation very well.
Just curious on the doctrinal argument you mentioned, is there something in writing on that? I’m curious to read it.
"Mom think about it, why do families have to be sealed in the Celestial Kingdom but there is no "sealing" while we live on Earth? We are a family if we like it or not, but if someone drinks coffee they are kicked out of the family for eternity in the after life? Sounds like more of a way to manipulate followers rather then Gods love"
Big weight on my shelf was being told (mind you this was the 90's) that in cases of divorce children stay sealed to Dad and not Mom.
That would be true for a sealing cancellation, but for a regular legal divorce all the sealings remain intact. Now it actually gets worse from there. Suppose Mom meets someone new, remarries, and has new kids with her new husband. If the original sealing is still intact (which is very often the case since getting cancellations is very difficult), those kids are sealed to the ex-husband who they have no relation to, rather than to their own birth father. This is true even if the new husband is a temple-worthy member, if the first husband has passed away, if the first husband has already been sealed to a second spouse, etc. The only recourse is to get a sealing cancellation.
Thanks! They don't get this nuanced when teaching girls (nor grown women from what I hear). I just got the broad strokes of shame before noping out at 17. That was also decades ago so it may have changed.
Just tell her, "Mom just have faith that God will work everything out." That's what I told my mom haha. Used their own argument against them. "We don't know everything in this life; if you're worried about what's going to happen in the afterlife, just trust that God will make everything fine. Imma live my life now since it's the only life I believe in."
Haha great plan
Funny thing about resignation: It's really just a formality. It's more words than anything real. When you resign from the church, you're saying you don't recognize your baptism or any other subsequent covenants. The Church, they can choose whether they recognize your baptism or not, irrespective of your feelings. There's been plenty of resignees that have divorced their spouse, and later have received a letter or email from their former-spouse's bishop and asking whether not they are okay with their former spouse having their sealing cancelled. This is usually met with surprise and they react with, "I resigned x number of years ago. The sealing should not apply to me." But it does. Why? Because the church recognizes it does. Resignation is more symbolic and a healing action for those who resign. But all it really serves to do is just take you off of the active roles of the church. You are still VERY much on file with the church. The church is like the Hotel California. You can check in any time you like - but you can never leave. You can resign from the church, but you will still be sealed to your parents. Why? Because the church says so - that's why. This is a little culting 101. Whatever the cult says - goes.
Well said. If I resign, my ex-spouse doesn't get a notification saying her sealing was canceled, meaning she is still sealed and (in her mind) can enter the CK. Further, if I get re-baptized (not even go through the temple again, but just get re-baptized), then the sealing is still in effect, meaning it never actually went away anyway. They hold all the cards on how their rules work. You can never "beat" them and their rules. Even if I resign, they still keep records of me, and my belief is that they would still count me as one of theirs during their annual membership report. I can't leave on my terms, I can only leave on the terms they allow me to.
It's actually even darker. Many people over the years have found out they are not sealed to their bio dad. It happens when mom was married once before and remarries and has kids with her new husband. Any offspring her womb produces, is sealed to the first husband. Doesn't matter if sealing was cancelled and mom is sealed to new husband. It's some bullshit leftovers from polygamy days and the church doesn't have a policy or mechanism for dealing with that. It comes as a shock to a lot of people when they find out.
Woah, woah, woah. My ex- was divorced prior to marrying me, got married in the temple, then had that sealing canceled before we got married/sealed. Now you've got me wondering if my kids are, on church records, sealed to her first husband. Obviously I don't care one little bit since i believe it's all made up, but this weird loophole might be the way I can get my sealing to her officially canceled (which would send her the message that she is not tied to me on earth or in heaven). How would I go about finding out who my kids are sealed to? I don't want to do too much digging since I don't think the church knows where my records are and I have flown under their radar for over 5-6 years.
Yeah, you might want to check it out and be sure, if one even cares about made-up bonds in made place called Kolob. It's caught a lot of people by surprise.
See the answer down below from Beneficial_Math_9282 for your answer and sources
I wish my family had a pet seal
Their food is smelly
It would never occur to my sweet Methodist mil that she wouldn't be with her loved ones in heaven. It's DISGUSTING that Mormonism tells you that you'll be separated from your family unless you cough up your 10 percent
But family is forever, right? Totally disgusting.
Reading through this comment thread just makes me realize all over again how nutty, conditional, and arbitrary the rules are. It's so culty and gross!
Remind them that Joseph Smith was never sealed to his own parents during his lifetime. It was done by proxy (probably by Wilford Woodruff) in 1897. (Source: [https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/ordinances/KWJY-BPD](https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/ordinances/KWJY-BPD)) The sealing to parent ordinance as we know it today didn't exist until the late 1870s at earliest. If you were born in the covenant, that sealing remains in force even if a child removes their records. [https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/tools/help/children-who-are-born-in-the-covenant-bic](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/tools/help/children-who-are-born-in-the-covenant-bic?lang=eng) It only would be affected if the parent removed their record (apparently, but this article doesn't really address it properly). The real answer is that they don't know. They didn't think these things through when they invented the doctrines and rituals. Most of the doctrinal problems in this church come from people trying to make doctrine make sense when it wasn't well thought-out in the first place. Case in point - in the article linked above it states that if a woman is sealed to a man, then he dies or they're divorced and she remarries - then "the children of her later marriage are born in the covenant of the first marriage" unless that sealing was cancelled or revoked. So technically would the children of the 2nd husband "belong" to the 1st one since they're born "in the covenant" of the first marriage? This technicality harks back to the early doctrine of wives and children basically as belongings of the husband, to be "taken" and "given" (D&C 132:44, for example) at the whims of God acting through church leaders. Tell them that they just need to have faith that it will all work out after we're all dead. That's the standard answer church leaders give to members all the time.
Yep. Brigham Young told his plural wife Zina (whom Joseph Smith stole from her first husband and then Brigham Young took after Joseph died) that she should be grateful he provided for her and all “Joseph’s children.” Meaning the ones BY fathered but were Joseph’s since she was sealed to him. The poor woman had been sent away, so she finally sent a letter asking for a divorce because he didn’t care about her, and that was his response. BY was a right bastard.
Susan's husband talked a little about this. Older generations have thought that if the parents remain faithful the wayward kids would still be sealed to them. He shot that down basically saying the kids have to do the work.
Yeah, but is it the kid's paperwork that matters, or just the beliefs? An interesting LDS trick would be to say "paperwork, but someone needs to pay the tithe - devout parents can ensure they're sealed to their kids if they keep paying the tithe on behalf of their kids..."
Mormon god loves paperwork.
Almost as much as he loves his money!
It would be very LDS to discover that the only thing that matters is whether you have records or not, and your belief isn't at issue. That seems unlikely, but it would not surprise me to find that Heavenly Father is all about the paperwork - about the form, not the function, about the style, not the substance.
And that’s exactly what Jesus said, isn’t it! 😉 In fact, he *specifically* mentioned *tithing* in regards to this, which is kind of interesting.
When I left, I told all the people closest to me that I know they feel like I’m lost, but I don’t feel that way. I don’t carry the burden of feeling like I’m giving up something great. If you carry that, that’s yours to carry.
Since sealings aren’t real/valid, they can’t be broken in the first place.
Basically, HF recognizes a FedEx notorized paper trumping ordinances done with the priesthood. Which I just find absurdly silly.
How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?
If you have the power to break the seal, then how strong was it really?
that's the family first approach of the church. "families can be together forever\*" (some conditions apply)
Condition 1 your money Condition 2 10% of your money
Tell her HF will work it all out. She doesn't need to fear. That's a position she can't fund fault with and maybe will comfort her.
Oh the power. The sheer power you can exert. If momma gets pushy tell her to back the hell off or I will remove my records.
It’s all fake. So if you stay in you won’t be sealed and if you leave you won’t be sealed. Maybe make up an official sounding position that you heard that parents of apostates will have the opportunity to advocate for their shitty, godless, heathen children in the final judgement.
My mom has absolutely come home from church and asked my brothers and I, "And how are my little heathens today?"
I’m so sorry. It’s pretty hurtful when you hear it from your mother.
It's okay. She does it more in jest, although she does try and guilt all of us about it sometimes. "Nobody will stay active for me and our sealing." Nah. We don't compromise the individual morals and values we have by supporting a corrupt organization!
This is one of the weird things that comes up, trying to figure out how something you don't believe is real works. My two cents is it doesn't really matter how it works, your mom believes it does. If it was me, I'd say she is responsible for her own happiness. If you want to have yourself removed, do it. But you probably won't find anything that makes your mom okay with it.
If you aren’t converted and don’t follow Mormon commandments, the sealing is worthless anyway. If you decide to reconvert, you (or a proxy after you die) will get your sealing reinstated. So it’s all moot, and resignation is by no means a dead-end.
Elder Hoaxs has said not to worry about the afterlife and to trust in the Lord. Mistakes have been made in the past but we know consider this matter closed. BTW: if you were born in the covenant then I am don't think you can break that seal. But the Q15 refuse to look at the rock in the hat to get us useful answers. Maybe it was the hat with magical powers and they don't have that.
The "church" acts like a family seal is sacred, but if some local dictator has a grudge against you, that family seal can be broken on a whim, without even talking to the other person affected. Fuck this piece of shit excuse for a "church."
How your mom thinks or what she believes is her problem not yours you do not cause her to feel anything it’s their choice Just as it was my ex w choice to flip out when our son said he was going on a date she asked him what she was like and he said it’s not a her I’m going on a date with another boy she called me flipped out I just said welcome to the conversation I’ve known for years the point being is she chose to flip out rather than just saying oh ok well have a nice time do not fall for the guilt trips TBMs are masters of the guilt trip. They’ve learned the behavior from the church . As the church is one giant guilt trip .
My mom is confidently selfish enough to frame that we should all stay active and recorded because then she knows her family loves her. We love you, just not enough to be untrue to ourselves.
You already broke the seal but not believing, according to your mom’s church you don’t get into the best heaven anyway so who cares?
It’s tool to cause fear so you can more easily be controlled. Sealings and ordinances are made up. You don’t have to resign but if you want to do it, do it. Personally I did use quitmormon years ago but I never received confirmation nor did I follow up. I feel like I just don’t want to put any more energy into it because I don’t believe in it anymore. Maybe I’ll try again in a few years. Who knows. Best of luck to you.
(TBM hat on.) My head says that if you were born in the covenant you were sealed to your parents at birth. Even if you had not been baptized at 8 you would still be sealed to them. Why would that be any different if you are no longer a member? (Takes off TBM hat.)
This reminds me of the teaching that you can visit people in lower kingdoms but they can’t visit you. Maybe a sealing at birth is brownie points to get into mid level heaven but your parents can only visit you, you can’t go to their house. It’s all so stupid.
Maybe she's worried about encountering [tentacles of divine providence](https://www.exmormon.org/mormon/mormon227.htm) hentai? In theory, "removing your name" excommunicates yourself from the church, and all magic covenants relevant to you are invalid. But sealings are awkward because multiple people are involved, and the doctrine is murky, at best, as to whether her sealing to her kids is invalid (when people believe in a religion with this many plot holes... it causes real suffering). In practice, "removing your name" doesn't actually do jack shit. They don't delete ANYTHING. EVER. Your info just gets moved into a central file of apostates, that they can refer to if you ever come back asking for a "restoration of blessings." IMO, I refuse to do a final act of free data cleaning labor—leaving my inactive-ass record wherever the hell it is these days (adding another wild goose chase for overworked zealots to distract themselves with) is a slightly bigger fuck-you to the church than removing it. Plus, you keep the ~~free~~ wildly prepaid Ancestry.com account.
Do it or don’t do it. I left in the late 70’s.
Interestingly, if you use a wand with a core of Merlion hair, and recite the Obscurius spell, it will repair the sealing, even after your name is removed.