Why is ancestry so important to mormons

Mormons believe that these rites can be performed for those who have already died, and they call this proxy ordinances. This is the reason Mormons are so involved in genealogy: to ensure that all of their family members, living or dead, have the possibility to be joined forever in the familial bond.

No, just as living individuals have the option to accept or reject the work of ordinances, those who have died can also either accept or reject the gift of a proxy ordinance. Also, just because a family member did not have ordinances performed in life does not guarantee that proxy ordinances will be allowed by the Mormon Church.

Each family then submits the names to an LDS temple for further research to determine if proxy ordinance will be granted. There is a much deeper meaning and purpose to the genealogical research efforts of those of the Mormon Church. With ton doors protecting the entrance, the vault is intended to both repel intruders and survive a nuclear impact.

While the Granite Mountain Records Vault is off-limits to all but authorized personnel, many the records themselves are made available freely through several means. Interested individuals can unearth birth, death and marriage certificates, wills and probate records, land records, and church records by tapping resources including:. According to the church website, the Family History Library collection "includes the names of more than 3 billion deceased people from over countries. Most of the information held by the library is available online, but some is available only in written form or on microfiche.

It offers, free of charge, access to the church's huge collection of physical, microfilm, and digital ancestry records, along with volunteer and consulting help with the process of genealogical research.

The library also offers classes, workshops, programs, and even interactive activities for children. For those interested in visiting a satellite Family History Library, as of September , there are more than 5, Family History Centers in countries.

Most provide one-on-one help with genealogical search. Volunteers are members of the LDS Church and are described as individuals with a calling who are trained to become family history consultants. Their work, according to the Family Search website, is to "create inspiring experiences that bring joy to all people as they discover, gather, and connect their family on both sides of the veil.

In addition to the Family History Centers, interested individuals can visit FamilySearch affiliate libraries. These are libraries, archives, museums, and genealogical societies that work with LDS to house databases and limited documents.

The affiliate libraries may offer fewer resources than the Family History Centers. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints conducts research into genealogy in order to uncover the names of deceased relatives so that the Church can perform posthumous "proxy" baptisms on behalf of those individuals.

These baptisms are conducted based on the belief that only those baptized in the LDS Church whether living or dead can enter the kingdom of heaven. The Mormon Church combined volunteer efforts of hundreds of thousands of hours to complete the Freedmen's Bureau Projec t of two million records of freed slaves.

The Pulitzer Prize winning historian, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich , who is Mormon, has done a lot of work in uncovering the "ordinary" life of women in early America through their journals including The Midwife's Tale and this is in part because of Mormon emphasis on family history work that focuses us less on the so-called big events of history and more on the way that people have lived in the past. I believe that regardless of your perspective on Mormon temple work, Mormon genealogical work is valuable and honorable and if you haven't done it before, I urge you to go look up your folks and see what you find out about them.

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Latter-day Saints believe families can be together after this life. Therefore, it is essential to strengthen relationships with all family members, both those who are alive and those who have died.

Latter-day Saints believe that the eternal joining of families is possible through sacred sealing ceremonies that take place in temples. These temple rites may also be performed by proxy for those who have died. Consequently, for Latter-day Saints, genealogical research or family history is the essential forerunner for temple work for the dead.