Ask an ex-Mormon

[zwanzig]

Do they (you) all wear the undergarment?

If you wore it/them (I understand that they are two piece) what did it do for you?

Only if you have performed the certain ceremony, the Endowment, in the temple. Usually, this is reserved for after 18, and they get you at pivotal life events on the cusp of adulthood. For instance, young people spend their lives growing up feeling encouraged and pressured to go on a two year mission once they turn 18. So, when they graduate high school and are preparing to make this two year commitment, they are rushed to the temple to get their endowment done and then immediately sent off to serve this mission before they really have a chance to process what they just went through. Others, like me, wait until just before marriage to get it done, with the same thing sort of happening. You've been sold this idea your whole life that families can be together forever, that going to the temple with your spouse is the beginning of eternity together. You find the right person, fall in love, pray about it, and yes, this is the one I want to be in the eternities with. And then you let her pick the temple she wants you to take her to, get a date reserved for the ceremony, and everything else planned and then you get the endowment and before you get that chance to really question what you saw, you're back in the temple getting married. Once you get it done, what are you going to say? "Wait, I don't want to marry her because holy crap, that was weird!" It's all manipulation and social pressure.

You are expected to wear them for the rest of your life after that. The endowment ceremony itself is presented as this sacred step to getting closer to God, like a baptism only for adults. It is a three hour session of sitting in several different rooms and learning the secret handshakes and hand signs that let's God know you're trustworthy. You make a verbal promise to God not to reveal the special tokens to outsiders and to always remain pure and worthy of his trust in you. The garments themselves have symbols on them that mirror these hand signs and thus are a reminder of this promise as well as a physical reminder to remain pure. If you do so, they say the garments will protect you from bodily harm, like mithril chain mail. However, I have also heard examples of this as being a story of a guy in a plane crash who's body burned up except for the parts where his garments touched his skin.

Did you feel that? That cognitive dissonance just then? Heh. YEah.

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@Brian37

Agreed. Joseph Smith wasn't as ignorant as Mormons claim, as he was pretty well read and could recite the Bible in normal conversation. But he had a limited understanding of Christian history or even the rest of the world. So, his American centric views were borne of that. To this day, Mormons teach in Sunday school that America is exceptional and came about through providence for the specific purpose of bringing about Mormonism.

@no one

Very likely, yes. I wouldn't put it past her. *inadequately hides the album, Obscured by Clouds, behind my back*