For Time and All Eternities

by Mette Ivie Harrison

  But Rebecca shook her head emphatically. “No. Stephen is very insistent that living the Principle has to be an individual call from God. He doesn’t know why God called him, but he couldn’t turn away from it. He knows how hard the life is, though, and wouldn’t force it on any of his children.”

  I felt relieved, but confused. Obviously, Stephen thought his lifestyle was more godly than monogamy. Why wouldn’t he want the highest law for his children?

  Rebecca must have guessed that Kurt and I were trying hard to suppress our curiosity, because she added, “Stephen said that I was to answer any questions that you had about living the Principle while we’re waiting for him to return.”

  I admit, I was there to help Talitha, but I was dying to ask questions.

  “Go on, ask whatever you like,” Rebecca said, smiling faintly.

  I wanted to ask about hand-me-downs and chore charts and how much it cost a day to feed this many people. I wanted to ask if anyone ever forgot how many children they had, or which ones were theirs or whose house Stephen went to each night for dinner. I wanted to ask if the wives fought over Stephen and what their sex lives were like. But Kurt got there first.

  “Naomi said that Stephen didn’t talk about polygamy with you until some years after you were married,” Kurt said. “How did that happen?”

  Rebecca leaned back on the couch, smoothing out her dress with overly intense concentration. “We’d been married ten years, actually.” She paused to take a deep breath. “Stephen had always studied church history very carefully. Then one day he took me to the Salt Lake Temple. He made sure we had time to stay in the celestial room afterward. He told me everything, holding my hand on the white couch, whispering directly into my ear. How he’d been called to the Principle—how we’d both been called. He begged me to accept it.” She sounded choked up about a precious memory.

  I could see Kurt was rigid in shock at this. I felt much the same. Stephen had used the temple for this conversation? And the holiest of holy places, the celestial room? The celestial room was the place you were only allowed to enter after you had been through the sacred endowment ceremony, a place of pure peace and utter silence, so clean you would never see a piece of lint on the floor, and everything in it was perfectly white. And Stephen Carter had used that sacred space to tell his wife he wanted to marry other women?

  “I see,” I murmured, trying to disguise my disgust.

  “We’ve never been back to the temple since that day. Stephen was excommunicated not many months later,” said Rebecca, her tone mournful. “And though our bishop hasn’t excommunicated me, I haven’t been back. I think the bishop sees us as victims of a wayward man and keeps trying to help us in various ways.” She gave a brief, watery smile.

  Kurt’s expression was pinched, but he managed to keep quiet. I suspected he, too, felt pity for the wives and children involved in this.

  “Ten years after you were married,” I said aloud, thinking about what I had been like ten years after Kurt and I had married. All those young children in so few years—my body had been exhausted and flabby and I might not have always been pleasant to be around. “Did Stephen marry someone younger?” I hoped I wasn’t prying, but she had said to ask anything.

  “Jennifer was a little younger, but age had nothing to do with it,” Rebecca said. “She was the person we were both led to by the Spirit to invite to join us in living the Principle for the first time.”

  Kurt and I shared a look again, a real moment of communion. Led by the Spirit my ass, I thought.

  “People from the outside always think it’s about the sex. That’s the last thing it has anything to do with it,” Rebecca went on, utterly sincere and straight-faced. “It’s a spiritual marriage first and foremost. Everything else is just figuring out what works best for whom.”

  “What about your sister?” I asked. “When did she join the—uh—group?”

  Rebecca looked down. “Sarah was the fourth wife, the third spiritual wife. She’s fifteen years younger than I am. She was just a child when I married Stephen.”

  I couldn’t read Rebecca’s emotion here. Was she jealous of her sister, or sad for her? I didn’t have any sisters so I tried to imagine sharing a house with one of my brothers. No. We’d never survive.

  “Have you ever considered joining one of the other polygamous groups?” I asked. I’d heard of various groups, like the Kingston clan and the Apostolic United Brethren in Utah County, and I thought there were some in Arizona, as well.

  “No, no. Stephen thinks they’re all completely crazy. Or evil,” said Rebecca with a sad expression.

  Kurt put a hand to his mouth at this, stifling a laugh, I think. I covered the gaffe by saying, “Why is that?”

  “The way they treat their wives and children is scandalous. No education. Nearly enslaving them. No freedom to choose their own lives. It’s one of the reasons Joanna is here.”

  “Joanna?” asked Kurt.

  “She’s the youngest and newest of the wives, and she’s from the FLDS. She ran away when she was only sixteen years old and her daughter Grace was a baby. She had to seek legal emancipation from her parents before she could be assured she wouldn’t be sent back. Poor child.”

  Which one, mother or daughter? Both, probably.

  I didn’t disagree with Stephen’s assessment of the FLDS. Young girls in that community were often denied an education past the sixth grade, forced to provide childcare, cooking, cleaning, and other unpaid labor, and then married off by age thirteen or fourteen to begin a life of bearing a dozen or more children for an older, authoritarian man who had ten other wives and a hundred children. Many of the women never escaped because they were too caught up in mothering children they could not leave or care for financially without the help of the FLDS community. But this one girl had gotten free—only to join another polygamous life. Why? Was it just too hard for her to stop thinking of the world—or herself—in that way?

  “A marriage with one other partner seems hard enough,” said Kurt. “With so many, it must magnify the problems exponentially.” The mathematical metaphor was very Kurt, and I tried not to wince at the implication that he thought marriage to me was difficult.

  “It can go bad, I know that,” Rebecca said. “We all went in with our eyes open, though. I’ve seen the problems some people have with the Principle. But they are all human mistakes. Jealousy, gossip, greed, anger. What God grants is the capacity to overcome these. That is why the Principle is the way we must live. It’s the only way to really become godlike and reject all of our mortal flaws.”

  The way she spoke about it seemed so devout. Of course, she was converted to it, but it wasn’t that she thought she was better than anyone else, just that this was one way she’d found to live the gospel’s command to be less selfish. Who couldn’t use more help in that quest? I certainly could, even if I couldn’t believe God expected me to do what Rebecca had done.

  “Jealousy and gossip are certainly problems for everyone,” said Kurt, who was clearly less moved by Rebecca’s speech than I was.

  “If I hadn’t come to my own conclusion that God had called me to practice polygamy, I would never have agreed to it. And Stephen was serious when he told me that I had to agree or he wouldn’t do it,” she said earnestly.

  “What are your thoughts about Emma Smith?” I said, going back to the history of Mormon polygamy, where my opinions were more solid. “She didn’t agree and Joseph married other women anyway.” Emma Smith had hated polygamy so much that when she learned Brigham Young planned to continue the practice even after Joseph Smith’s death, she refused to follow him and the Saints west to Utah—instead, she left and created the first offshoot of the Mormon church, now called the Community of Christ. Rebecca had done what Emma Smith had not—condoned her husband’s desire to marry other women. But Stephen Carter had done what Joseph Smith had not—waited until his first wife ag
reed.

  “Joseph Smith was a prophet of God who was asked to do a nearly impossible thing,” Kurt had said almost automatically. He always tensed when people mentioned Joseph Smith in a way that was less than reverential.

  “Well, at least we can agree on that,” said Rebecca, and at that, the back door opened and Stephen Carter himself was home.

  Chapter 7

  Standing up to shake his hand, I was immediately impressed by the energy of Stephen Carter’s presence even though he was probably only five foot nine or ten, average height. He was a handsome man, with dark hair containing only a hint of gray, a strong chin, a Roman nose just like Naomi’s, and bright, penetrating blue eyes. I could understand why some women might find him very attractive.

  “But what about Kenneth and Naomi?” Stephen asked, looking around the room after we had made the necessary introductions. “I thought they were going to be here, as well.”

  I looked at Kurt, hoping no one would blame us for this change in plans.

  “Naomi texted and said that she had a test she had to study for,” Rebecca said calmly. “She and Kenneth will be here as soon as they can make it.”

  “All right, then. I suppose we don’t need them to explain our way of life to you,” said Stephen. “Has Rebecca already talked about our conversion to the Principle?”

  He turned to face Kurt and the question seemed addressed to him alone, almost as if Rebecca and I were not in the room. It wasn’t the first time I’d been ignored by another Mormon man talking to my husband, and it probably wouldn’t be the last, but it was still annoying. I glanced at Rebecca and she met my eyes with apology.

  “Yes, she did,” said Kurt diffidently. His chin was lifted, making the difference in their heights clearer. He was several inches taller than Stephen.

  “Sit, sit,” Stephen said, waving his hands to include me this time.

  After a moment, we complied. I regretted accepting his invitation to sit almost immediately because Stephen stepped forward and loomed over us, as if speaking on a pulpit. “Do you know what Brigham Young said when he first heard about the Principle?”

  I watched as Kurt twitched. He was used to being in control of the pulpit every Sunday. But he remained seated by me and shook his head. “I don’t,” he said.

  That seemed to give Stephen full license to expand, and expand he did. “He said that he saw a hearse passing and wished most fervently to trade places with the man in the coffin. That was how much he hated the idea of plural marriage. But he was converted to it because God spoke to him. It was a restoration of an ancient and holy practice.” A grand gesture with outstretched arms. “Abraham and Jacob had multiple wives, and if the true church was to be restored, it had to include all of the tenets from the past.”

  “I know why Joseph Smith restored polygamy,” Kurt said tartly.

  But Stephen continued the lecture anyway, going all the way back to the 1830s, adding in details I’d never heard of before, including a promise to Joseph in the First Vision that he would become like Abraham, that Joseph’s seed would also “number as the sands of the sea” through his progeny, and the claim that all of the prophets of the Book of Mormon had practiced polygamy, from Lehi and Nephi to Alma and Samuel the Lamanite, who had prophesied the birth of Christ.

  “Have you never wondered why so few women are named in The Book of Mormon?” Stephen asked, turning to me.

  “Well, uh—” was all I got out. I don’t think he really wanted me to say more. This was his chance to shine, his own sermon he was expecting us to listen to with rapt attention. I felt that discomfort I sometimes feel when I attend other Christian worship services, where there are so many notes that are exactly what I think, mixed in with things I don’t like at all or even find rather offensive, like the curse of Eve or celibacy for priests.

  “Women were scrubbed out of the Book of Mormon,” Stephen continued, “ever since Heber J. Grant worked to spread the missionary work worldwide. He felt that all references to polygamy in our own past and in our doctrine had to be wiped away and he did his best to convince converts and lifelong Mormons that the LDS church is simply another Christianity, rather than a radical return to the old practices of Judaism.”

  I couldn’t help but glance at Rebecca, who was staring at her husband with awe, like the man she knew as a mortal had become rather more than that in an inspired speech. I’d had a couple of moments like that with Kurt, I admit, although maybe not as many as he would have liked since he became bishop.

  Stephen continued, “When an angel came with a sword of destruction and threatened Joseph’s life if he did not begin to practice polygamy in 1839, it had to come three times over a period of months before he listened. He waited as long as he possibly could before he spoke to Emma about what God had revealed to him.

  “And then when Emma would not listen, Joseph had no choice but to begin to seek out those women whom God had reserved for him to be sealed to. Emma’s reluctance meant that he no longer had to ask for her permission, but it also taught him that he had to keep this most sacred of all parts of Mormonism secret because the agents of Satan would try to destroy him even as he showed those who were willing to hear from him how to become gods.”

  Becoming gods in the celestial kingdom wasn’t something Mormons talked about much anymore, though it had certainly been part of polygamy and there were remnants of this belief in the temple ceremony. You had to promise some pretty hefty rewards, in my opinion, to get people to do something so inherently difficult.

  “One of the women Joseph married was Eliza R. Snow, the great poetess and future president of the Relief Society. But it was only recently revealed by the historian Andrea Radke-Moss that Eliza had been gang-raped by enemies of the church, and injured in a way that meant she would never be able to have children. Marrying her and other stalwart women like her was a way for Joseph to show them that God still loved them and that they would not be left out of the promises of the temple sealing in the eternities. She might never have her own increase, but she could share with her sister wives in theirs. And when Joseph died, Brigham Young stood in and took his place, giving Eliza his name and his honor and protection for the rest of her days. How could anyone argue that such a use of polygamy was wrong or in any way sexually motivated?”

  Though I didn’t trust everything Stephen said, I felt something within me stir at this explanation of Eliza Snow, who had been a great Mormon poet and leader of women. Her beautiful song “O My Father” was one of my favorites and I had always wondered why, when she disagreed with him so often, she had married Brigham Young. For a moment, I found myself nodding with Stephen Carter, agreeing with him that at least for Eliza, polygamy might have made sense.

  Then I shook myself. I’d better be more careful listening to Stephen Carter’s incantatory storytelling or I was going to end up thinking Kurt and I should start looking around for another wife. Stephen Carter was so charismatic that I could see how I could be taken in, despite disagreeing so strongly with him.

  “In 1841, after Emma had refused to embrace the doctrine of celestial marriage, Joseph led another woman to the temple and was sealed to her first. Can you imagine how that made him feel? The woman he had fallen in love with as a young man, the woman he had gone through so much sorrow with, had shared his children’s births and deaths with, was not with him on that most important day of his life?” asked Stephen.

  I had always imagined it from Emma’s perspective. Had Joseph told her coldly what he was planning to do that day? Had she argued with him? Threatened to leave him? Had he done it secretly, furtively? Had she found out the truth from the other woman, now sealed to Joseph for time and all eternities while Emma was his in this life only?

  I looked at Rebecca, who was waving at one of the children in the backyard, trying to mouth some encouragement. It was exactly what I thought a good mother would do, but Stephen’s body language showed irrita
tion at the distraction for a moment before he decided to ignore her and focus on me and Kurt again.

  “Joseph Smith said, ‘a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has the power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation.’ And Brigham Young took up that challenge. After the Saints were chased from their homes in Nauvoo in 1844 and so many died that terrible winter waiting by the Mississippi River for spring, Brigham Young was inspired by God to lead his people to a place where they could practice the Principle in peace. And under his leadership, they made the desert blossom as a rose in the great new state of Deseret.”

  Brigham Young had been a great secular leader. The American Moses, some called him. His spiritual ideas had been downplayed by church leaders since then, from the Adam-God doctrine—the belief that Adam was himself God, an idea the LDS church has rejected—to his insistence that black skin was a sign of a curse from God and that no white person could ever marry someone of any other race without losing their temple blessings.

  “Brigham Young thought he had left the government that had rejected his people and his religion, but the United States could never stop pressing its borders. And so the only hope for statehood and real political power for the Saints was to give into the demands of an ungodly government. That was why John Taylor, the third president of the church, gave the priesthood keys to the Council of Seven Friends, who continued to practice the law of the celestial kingdom secretly.”

  What? I’d never heard about any Council of Friends, but I figured this was something else that Stephen had invented and pressed into the history of the church to support his own choices.

  “Wait. What about Wilford Woodruff?” Kurt asked. “He was the next president and had all the keys of the church.”

  “No,” explained Stephen patiently. “After John Taylor gave the keys of the priesthood to the council, Woodruff only had the keys of the presidency of the church, which is why he had no power to alter the true and everlasting Covenant when he gave the unholy Manifesto of 1890, which banned polygamy.”