The LDS Guide to Dating & Marriage, Part 9: The Spirit and "Praying to know"

[Previous posts in the series:  Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8]

The workings of the Holy Spirit can be mysterious--oftentimes receiving the right answers depends entirely on asking the right questions. As in all areas of life, the Holy Ghost plays a larger part in LDS dating and marriage than in the secular world. In this section, we'll discuss two specific--and similar--spiritual issues related to dating and marriage: (1) the use of 'spiritual experiences' to determine marriage partners, and (2) praying to know if your boyfriend/girlfriend is 'right'.

Spiritual experiences

 Among LDS college-age youth, you hear stories like these all the time:

"Bob and I went for a walk around the temple and felt the Spirit so strongly, we both knew it was 'right' to get engaged right that second..."

"Sherry and I went out for a couple of weeks, and I felt the Spirit every time she and I were together, so I know that she's the 'right' one to marry..."

"After I started dating Tommy, things in my life just started going better. I got a better job, I got better grades on my tests... I know that these were signs that Tommy is the 'right' one for me."

It's easy to view stories like these with a eye of skepticism. The issue of if/how the Holy Ghost works in regards to relationships is a hard one to discuss with any depth. After all, how can you judge whether person X or Y has really received a direct personal revelation from the Holy Ghost or not? It's hard enough discerning if you have received a answer from the Holy Spirit sometimes--let alone someone else.

Personal revelation and direct spiritual guidance are two of the primary doctrinal foundations of the LDS Church. One of the fundamental concepts of the gospel is that (to worthy Church members) the gift of the Holy Ghost is always there for the purpose of guiding you through many of life's important decisions. And what more important decision is there from a secular and a spiritual perspective than whom to marry?

Still...there are questions. You don't have to be a cynic to think that, while the Holy Ghost can and does work in the lives of worthy Church members, not every claimed 'spiritual experience' by a Church member is really from the Holy Ghost. Sometimes even credible spiritual experiences can lead to incorrect conclusions.

Example: 'Mary' goes to a dinner and a movie with 'John' on Saturday night, then goes to a Church fireside with 'Dan' on Sunday night. Later, Mary reflects that she had a much stronger spiritual experience when she was with Dan than John and surmises that that is a 'sign' that Dan is the right one for her to marry.

Well, gee...think about it.  Why wouldn't she have had a more spiritual experience on Sunday going to a fireside than just dinner and a movie?  I'm quite sure, given the context, that Mary and Dan conversed about more spiritual things at the time than Mary and John did--but is that really justification for Mary to conclude that it is the Holy Ghost telling her Dan is 'right' for her, not John?  Wouldn't it be reasonable to conclude that it was just due to the circumstances they were in?  That the spiritual experience meant nothing more significant than...she felt the Spirit during a fireside?

"Temple walks" are another good example of spiritual experiences that can go awry. A number of couples who've met only briefly have gone for walks around the temple...and come back engaged--enough so that it's become a common joke around campus. (I'll share one such story in the next section...)

So you were walking around the temple with a member of the opposite sex and happened to feel the Spirit. You were walking around the temple!  The temple, as we're taught from primary on, is the House of the Lord, and the place for eternal marriage. Why wouldn't you (a) feel the Spirit and (b) be reminded of marriage?  Does this mean that you should necessarily marry the person who happened to be standing next to you at the time?

Note that I'm not discounting the possibility of personal revelation, especially around the temple. Only pointing out that just feeling the Spirit when you're with someone does not necessarily mean you should marry them...

Praying to Know

The second issue is when Church members deliberately seek out spiritual guidance in the form of personal prayer to know if your partner is 'right'. The spiritual experiences (if any) are not 'accidental' this time, but earnestly requested...although many of the underlying issues are the same. Like with many prayers, receiving the proper answer may require asking the proper question to begin with.

When you pray to know if person X is right for you to marry...what do you mean when you say 'right'?  We've already discussed that there are no perfect marriages, nor perfect partners, so 'right' cannot mean 'perfect'.  With our working theorem that any marriage can succeed, wouldn't that mean that any marriage partner can be 'right'--if you're willing to accept him/her?  What is it exactly that you are asking for?  Is it simply a 'yes, he/she's temple worthy' or 'no he/she's not' signal?  Or is it supposed to be a sign that this person is actually a very good match for you (fitting right in with "The One" theory...) If the latter, what criteria would even a omniscient God use to decide who's a good 'match' with whom? Beyond the worthiness issue, are you sure He cares that deeply about the who, versus the how and where you marry?  How can you tell if your 'spiritual witness' is really a message from the Holy Ghost, rather than just the good feelings you usually get when you think about someone you like a lot...?

In college, I was good friends with a girl who met a guy one summer, started dating him, prayed about it, got an answer that he was 'right', and was intent on marrying him.  Later, he started acting strangely (often rudely) and the relationship withered and died--leaving her in tears. Soon after that, she started an email/phone relationship with a guy in another state. After a few months of communicating long distance, she flew out to meet him in person for a week and came back engaged. She told me that this time she had also prayed to know if he was 'right' and had gotten an affirmative answer.

You can probably understand my skepticism when hearing this...because, of course, I had already heard this once before. How seriously could I take her assertion that the Holy Ghost had said her boyfriend was the 'right' one for her when she had said the exact same thing about her first boyfriend a few months before? Is the Holy Ghost playing a game?  Is He, perhaps, honestly telling her either marriage had the possibility of success even considering the character flaws of the first boyfriend? (Note: if any marriage can succeed, then the answer to this prayer would always be 'right'...right?)  Or...could it be that her 'answers' were just the good feelings she created herself when pondering guys whom she really liked (at the time) and wanted to marry, and had nothing to do with the Holy Ghost?  In either case, what good had praying to know if he was 'right' done her?

I have no idea whether her 'answers' were really from the Holy Ghost or not...just as I have no idea if the two of them (who got married soon afterwards) are happily married now or not. I do know that if they're happily married now it is because of what they've done after the wedding, not just because they married the 'right' person. I wonder about whether the guys and girls who are praying to know if their relationship is 'right' are even asking the 'right' question to begin with.  Are many of them simply deceiving themselves?

I freely admit I did not pray about whether my wife (The Baroness) was 'right' for me before we got married. I don't expect the Lord to give me direct guidance for decisions in which I already have the full capacity to make it myself.  And--under our working theories--I don't believe there is an absolute 'right' person for me...only imperfect people forming imperfect matches where I have to decide myself whether to make the leap and work at making it succeed. (I did pray, however, to help me adequately prepare to face whatever challenges lay ahead and to have the guidance to make our marriage succeed--not the same thing, of course...)

The impact of spiritual experiences and divine guidance in creating temple marriages will likely always be a mystery. I can't prove that the Spirit didn't play a direct role in some or all of the above stories. Still, I find it hard to accept all the spiritual experiences I hear about at face value. Doesn't it seem unlikely at least that all of the stories you hear were really due to the direct influence of the Holy Ghost? Isn't it possible that many of the spiritual experiences leading to marriage involved people who either (1) liked their girlfriend/boyfriend a lot and wanted the answer to be affirmative before they even asked, or (2) wanted to be married--to anyone--really badly and thus interpreted anything spiritual happening involving the opposite sex as conforming to their desires?

I believe in prayer, and in answers to prayer.  However, the trick to receiving and interpreting an answer to prayer is figuring out what you need to ask in the first place...

Next:  A 'temple walk' story and what I learned from it...