Writing spurt

Personal essay on step mothering, done. Paper on gender and the Restoration for next month's JWHA conference, pending. With the few creative juices I have left, I'm blogging.

Mike and I have been teaching Sunday School in our Ogden ward since January. Mostly, it's been a fun gig. We trade off teaching every other week and have been out of town for some of the more loaded lesson topics.

Neither of us wants to tackle this week's lesson: "Sealed...for time and all eternity."

It's a touchy subject for a couple of reasons. WE aren't sealed. We opted to get married in a beautiful civil ceremony conducted by a dear friend rather than get sealed/married in a Mormon temple. We could have gone the temple route if we'd wanted to, but we felt strongly about having all our loved ones present as we united our lives.

Since then, we've looked into getting sealed and have run into a couple of snags.

One, Mike is still sealed to his ex-wife. It's possible to cancel that sealing and petition for Mike and I to be sealed, but that means Mike's kids would be unsealed from their mother and only remain sealed to their dad.

None of the kids are active in the church anymore and we're not sure if the ex is, either. It's unclear to me why their interests are the focus--seemingly more than my interests as Mike's current wife. Nevertheless, Mike is unwilling to spiritually untether his kids from their mother.

Two, I am unwilling to be sealed to Mike while he's still sealed to his ex. That's a little too close to polygamy for my taste. I had thought the plan was to cancel Mike's previous sealing and petition for clearance for us to be sealed to each other.

Three, it's a total double standard. Men can be sealed to more than one woman, but women who want to remarry in the temple have to get any previous sealing canceled before the new sealing is allowed to proceed.

The result: an impasse where getting sealed is concerned. And I'm pretty pissed off about policies that have forced us between this particular rock and hard place. Being forced to choose which family stays sealed or gets unsealed doesn't feel very family-friendly to me.

I taught Sunday School last, so technically it's Mike's turn. Then again, he taught several weeks in a row when I was swamped by Sunstone symposium prep. He's asked, "Do I really have to teach tomorrow?" a couple of times today.

To which I replied that I thought the person who's less angry about the subject of sealing ought to be the one to teach it.