Mormon leaders, like the twice-married Nelson and Oaks, can't have it both ways on polygamy 

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I recently watched the Netflix series Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey, a chillingly informative documentary covering the rise and fall of Fundamentalist Latter-day Saint (FLDS) prophet Warren Jeffs. The docuseries presented everything from the conservative—yet benign—day-to-day lifestyles of many FLDS families to the gruesome acts of sexual abuse that Jeffs enacted on his dozens of wives, including teenagers as young as 12 years old.

The central feature that distinguishes the FLDS Church from the mainstream Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) is their differing views on modern polygamy. But a core aspect of the LDS Church's foundation in the 19th century was a theological and pragmatic justification for polygamy, a practice that Joseph Smith ushered in via official revelation.

Smith argued that polygamy was necessary to increase reproduction on earth and was a divine requirement of the Celestial Kingdom, the highest degree of heaven in LDS theology. He too claimed dozens of wives, including teenage girls as young as 14 years old.

Marred by scandal, dishonesty and deception, plural marriage continued as an official church doctrine and practice until 1890, when then-LDS Church President Wilford Woodruff issued a manifesto prohibiting its future practice.

As a result, the mainstream LDS Church incrementally abandoned polygamy in the face of increasing political and legal pressure from the U.S. federal government. Currently, LDS leaders boldly condemn polygamist fundamentalist groups like the FLDS, distance themselves from checkered 19th-century polygamist teachings and excommunicate members found practicing plural marriage.

Despite unequivocal top-down condemnations of polygamy, the church's continued theological affiliation with plural marriage is not lost on its members. In perhaps the most thorough and effective treatment on this issue to date, The Ghost of Eternal Polygamy, LDS author Carol Lynn Pearson lays out the ways in which plural marriage continues to shape the teachings and practices of the modern church. She discusses the fact that LDS men are still allowed to become eternally sealed (i.e., married) in the temple to multiple women if their previous wife or wives have died.

LDS women, however, are not afforded this privilege and must annul their previous sealing in order to get resealed to a second man after a divorce or if a previous husband has passed. And in the case of divorce, it's important to note that men who are sealed to multiple women claim all the children to whom that previously divorced woman is sealed. While LDS leaders downplay these disparities by claiming uncertainty about what happens in the afterlife, the reality that only men are given eternal polygamous privileges is a continuous reminder of deep-seeded gender inequality that permeates the church all the way up to its pinnacle theological aspirations.

Perhaps the most conspicuous examples of this are the two most powerful men in the church today—President Russell M. Nelson and his first counselor, Dallin H. Oaks. Nelson's first wife Dantzel White passed away in 2005 and one year later, he married his current wife, Wendy Watson. Oaks' first wife, June Dixon, passed away in 1998. He married his current wife, Kristen McMain, several years later in 2000. Theologically speaking, both Nelson and Oaks are in eternal polygamous marriages with their two wives.

In addition to gender inequality, LGBTQ+ members must face the oppressive reality that they are prohibited from having even one marriage with a person they love, while prominent leaders of the church who disparage their relationships are allowed multiple marriages in the afterlife. It is especially ironic that LDS leaders have, for decades, defended the doctrinal sanctity and political necessity of "traditional marriage" while continuing to uphold eternal polygamous marriages in their theology and practice.

This contradiction is part of a broader historical pattern in which church leaders rhetorically distance themselves from socially unacceptable practices while maintaining underemphasized theological ties to such practices.

Another example of this phenomenon is the church's ongoing relationship with racism. Although they officially removed their 150-year temple and priesthood ban on people of African descent in 1978, the racist residue of LDS teachings continues to this day. In recent years, top leaders like President Nelson have condemned racism generally and have even received awards for doing so. However, LDS scripture still contains sections associating divine curses with "black skin" (see Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 5:21).

These paradoxical relationships with racism and polygamy reveal complex conundrums for the church when it comes to doctrines and practices that do not align with modern sensibilities. It seems that leaders want to have it both ways by maintaining political and cultural relevancy and power while simultaneously clinging to less palatable, yet crucial doctrines. In this era of increased accountability and transparency, that approach is simply unsustainable.

In order to address the hypocrisy and contradiction embedded in male eternal polygamy, church leaders must either own up to the fact that polygamy is still a core feature of LDS doctrine or entirely remove it from their afterlife theology. Removing it would not only lead to increased doctrinal consistency but would also constitute a powerful step toward greater gender equality within the church.

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