Women's Rites

Jews have bar mitzvah, Catholics have confirmation, and Mormons have . . . endowment. Never heard of it? Not surprising, since this coming-of-age rite for all regular church members occurs only in temples that are strictly off limits to nonbelievers, and initiates vow to die rather than reveal details of the ceremony. Despite the secrecy shroud, news has leaked that Mormon officials last month instituted the most sweeping ritual changes in a century.

Among other things, the church deleted the pledge of wifely obedience demanded of women, who typically undergo endowment prior to temple marriage. Now women merely join the men in pledging obedience to God. Another key change occurs in a dramatic representation showing a polytheistic Elohim dispatching Jehovah and Michael to create the world. The scene in which Satan pays a Protestant preacher to lure Mormons from their faith is out, perhaps because it offended converts from Protestantism. (The Latter-Day Saints still hold theirs to be the only authentic form of Christianity.)

The endowment has been altered over the decades, most notably by eliminating the oath to avenge church prophets and blood-curdling secrecy vows ("We agree that our throats be cut from ear to ear"). Ritual secrets are believed to let a Mormon pass into the highest levels of heaven. After performing the rite for themselves, Mormons may repeat it over and over for the vicarious benefit of dead relatives. But by some accounts, the number performing such "temple work" has been falling off. A briefer, modernized ritual could help reverse that trend. Says Mormon author Allen Roberts: "The ceremony is less harsh, less threatening, less offensive."