Garments are various articles of clothing used to dress the body. They may be worn for utilitarian or religious purposes or both. The Lord made “coats of skins” for Adam and Eve to cover their nakedness. (Gen. 3:21.) Special ceremonial and “holy garments” were worn by Aaron and the priests. (Ex. 28; Lev. 16; Ezek. 42:14.) Garments worn by angels are “pure and white above all other whiteness.” (D. & C. 20:6.) To avoid pride, garments of mortals should be “plain, and their beauty the beauty of the work of thine own hands.” (D. & C. 42:40-42.)
Much that is sacred and symbolical is taught by reference to garments. Kings and rulers were identified anciently by their robes of scarlet and purple; such a robe was placed on Christ in mocking derision by the soldiers. (Matt. 27:28-31; John 19:2-5,) When our Lord comes again, as a sign of impending judgment, he “shall be red in his apparel, and his garments like him that treadeth in the wine-vat.” (D& C. 133:46-51; Isa. 63:1-6) (pp. 278-279)
Note: As a former Mormon Chuck Sackett wrote an exposé on the occult practices which take place in Mormon temples. Here he describes the Garment of the Holy Priesthood ceremony:
“Every Mormon who ‘receives his Endowments’ (including all Mormon missionaries) is dressed by a temple worker in the “Garment of the Holy Priesthood” which he is required to wear day and night, 365 days a year, until he is buried in it. It is removed only for bathing and to change it, and for certain ‘public appearance’ exceptions. Originally these resembled old fashioned ‘long johns,’ though they are now cut off at knee-length and are short-sleeved (or cap-sleeved for women).”[1]
Receiving the Garment of the Holy Priesthood and the New Name.
“Brother [or Sister] _________, having authority, I place this garment upon you which you must wear throughout your life. It represents the garment given to Adam when he was found naked in the Garden of Eden, and is called the Garment of the Holy Priesthood. Inasmuch as you do not defile it, but are true and faithful to your covenants, it will be a shield and a protection to you against the power of the destroyer until you have finished your work here on earth. With this garment I give you a new name, which you should always remember, and which you must keep sacred, and never reveal except at a certain place that will be shown you hereafter. The name is ‘__________’”[2]
“Closer examination reveals a pair of button-holes over the right breast sewn in the form of a square, reminding the Mormon of the need for exactness and honor in living up to his temple vows. Over the left breast a pair of button-holes in the form of a compass remind the Mormon that all truth may be circumscribed into one great whole, and that all appetites and passions must be kept within certain bounds which the Lord has prescribed. One button-type hole over the navel recalls the need of constant nourishment for body and spirit, and an identical hole over the right knee signifies that every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Christ. (In the early Mormon temple ceremonies some of the marks were cut into the garment with a small knife while on the patron’s body, thus knicking his flesh and shedding his blood into the garment. See Leviticus 19:28, 21:5; Deuteronomy 14:1; and Jeremiah 16:6.) The same four marks are on the Veil of the temple in much larger dimensions. The temple worker tells the patron, as he or she is being dressed in this garment, that “it will be a shield and a protection to you from the power of the destroyer until you have finished your work on the earth, so long as you are true and faithful to the covenants you make in the temple this day.”
“Thus the garment serves as a magic talisman to the temple patron, and is to be his source of protection from the power of Satan throughout his lifetime. The patron is instructed that when the garment is worn out, he must cut the Priesthood markings off of it and burn them, after which the garment can be used for rags or for any other purpose. Thus we see that the magical “power” is in the Priesthood markings.
“In contrast to the above, the Christian is taught that his protection from Satan comes in a form quite different from this occultic, talismanic magic. Christians, in overcoming Satan’s attacks, are instructed in Scripture to put on something far more substantial than magic underwear with Masonic markings on it. (This is fully explained in Ephesians 6:12-18, and we highly recommend this form of protection to all readers.)”[3]
One may wonder why, when the first time a Mormon attends the temple endowment ceremony, he/she will be given a new name [usually a Biblical name]. These will supposedly be their names in eternity. The wife must tell her husband her new name, and no one else, as he is supposed to call her up in the resurrection.[4] If he does not call her up she would still resurrect, but not as his wife.
When the husband calls up his wife she becomes a Mother in Heaven and would populate the planet assigned to him.
“The doctrine that there is a Mother in Heaven was affirmed in plainness by the First Presidency of the Church (Joseph F. Smith, John R. Winder, and Anthon H. Lund) when, in pre-existence and the origin of man, they said that ‘man as a spirit, was begotten and born of heavenly parents, and reared to maturity in the eternal mansions of the Father,’ that man is the ‘offspring of celestial parentage,’ and that ‘all men and women are in the similitude of the universal Father and Mother, and are literally the sons and daughters of Deity.” (Man, His Origin and Destiny, pp. 348-355.)[5]
LDS Apostle Charles W. Penrose[6] wrote:
“In the divine economy, as in nature, the man “is the head of the woman,” and it is written that “he is the savior of the body.” But “the man is not without the woman” any more than the woman is without the man, in the Lord. Adam was first formed, then Eve. In the resurrection, they stand side by side and hold dominion together. Every man who overcomes all things and is thereby entitled to inherit all things, receives power to bring up his wife to join him in the possession and enjoyment thereof.
“In the case of a man marrying a wife in the everlasting covenant who dies while he continues in the flesh and marries another by the same divine law, each wife will come forth in her order and enter with him into his glory.”[7]
This is not to say that the husband determines whether or not a woman will be resurrected or which level of Mormon heaven she will inherit. Only a worthy LDS priesthood holder will be able to call his worthy wife up from the grave to be his eternal mate in the Celestial Kingdom.[8] Brigham Young University professor W. John Walsh gave the following explanation:
First, Latter-day Saints do not believe that husbands have the ability to decide whether or not their wives will be 1) resurrected, or 2) enter the celestial kingdom. . . . Now, Latter-day Saints do believe that in some instances, a woman’s husband will be given the privilege of performing the resurrection ordinance for and in behalf of the Savior. In cases where a woman does not have a worthy husband, the Savior may allow her father to do so. Likewise, a man’s father will be given the privilege of resurrecting him. In such cases, the person performing the resurrection ordinance is simply performing the ordinance for and in behalf of the Savior. He is not acting on his own and has no ability to decide what degree of glory a person will live in for eternity. . . . Can a man refuse to call forth a worthy wife? Any man who would refuse to resurrect his wife at the Savior’s request would prove that he himself is unworthy of living in the celestial kingdom and the Savior would never ask such a person to perform the task in the first place.[9]
Brigham Young taught that resurrected will have the power to raise the dead to life:
“Michael the archangel (Adam) holds the keys of the resurrection and after a man is raised from the dead, has an immortal body and receives an ordination to hold the keys of the resurrection from under the hands of Michael or those having authority, he then has the power to raise the dead, and not before. Jesus was the first fruits of the resurrection. ‘He had power to lay down his life, and power to take it again.’ When he had lain in the grave three days an angel, some person who was appointed to this work, appeared, rolled back the stone and called Jesus forth. We have power here through the priesthood to lay hands upon the sick and they recover, to cast out devils, open the eyes of the blind and unstop the ears of the deaf according to the faith of the children of men. It is just as easy to raise the dead for one who is ordained unto this power as it is for us to administer in the ordinances of the House of the Lord here.”[10]
In the Holy Bible, the term heaven denotes, firstly, the blue firmament, or the region of the clouds that pass along the sky. Genesis 1:20, speaks of the birds “under the firmament of heaven”. In other passages, it denotes the region of the stars that shine in the sky. Furthermore, heaven is spoken of as the dwelling place of God; for, although God is omnipresent, He manifests Himself in a special manner in the light and grandeur of the firmament. Heaven also is the abode of the angels, for they are constantly with God and see His holy face. With God in heaven are likewise the souls of the just.[11] In Ephesians 4:8 sq., we are told that Christ conducted to heaven the patriarchs who had been in Paradise (limbus patrum). Thus, the term heaven has come to include both the happiness and the abode of just in the next life.
It is a comforting thought for the Catholic to believe that when our soul gains heaven we will spend eternity enveloped in the exquisite love of God rather than being concerned with the responsibilities of being a god or Heavenly Mother.
[1] Sackett, What’s going on in there, p. 12.
[2] Ibid., p. 20.
[3] Ibid., p. 13.
[4] Resurrection is the reunion of the spirit with an immortal physical body. The body laid in the grave is mortal; the resurrected physical body is immortal. The whole of man, the united spirit and body, is defined in modern scripture as the “soul” of man. Resurrection from the dead constitutes the redemption of the soul (D. &C. 88:15-16).
[5] McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, pp. 467-468).
[6] Charles William Penrose (1832 –1925) was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the LDS Church) from 1904 to 1911.
[7] Charles W. Penrose, Mormon Doctrine Plain and Simple, or Leaves from the Tree of Life, Salt Lake City, 1897, p. 66
[8] The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches of three degrees of glory in the afterlife—the celestial, terrestrial, and telestial. (D&C 76:50-98).
[9] W. John Walsh, “Do Husbands Resurrect Their Wives?” http://www.lightplanet.com/mormons/response/qa/women_resurrection.htm. Retrieved 9-11-2016
[10] Wilford Woodruff, Journal of Discourses, 3:323-324.
[11] 2 Cor. 5:1; Matt. 5:3, 12.