quote: Obviously, it would be courteous to offer the opportunity to the closer living relatives. I think there is an assumption that if somebody feels close enough to the person that they want to do the temple work, then they would get on it soon after the year was up.
posted
I can give an example of one misunderstanding of the rule, but I'd appreciate it if I don't get accused again of suggesting the rules should be disregarded. There has been an assumption (and like the one you just quoted above, it is not an assumption that I make, but I've seen it made enough times that I offer it as an explanation for people's behavior) that the rule to get the permission of the closest living relative only applies if that relative is a member who would want to do the work themselves. They figure that non-members wouldn't know you did the work anyway, so that must be the reason for the rule, right? Wrong. You need to get the permission of the closest living relative, member or not.
Posts: 1261 | Registered: Apr 2006
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I currently have 45 names reserved, with ordinances in various stages of completion. There are more there than I will get to in a year, definitely.
Let me explain why this comment is uninformed and a little unfair:
quote: Reserve a name, go do the name. Holding on to a name you may get around to in a year or so? That's just selfish and silly.
NFS is designed to encourage collaboration, not just to cut down on the duplication of temple work, but also to coordinate research goals. There is a lot of duplication of effort there.
In the past, you would not submit names to the temple until the research was to the point where you were confident that your work was accurate and complete. Two people could be researching on the same family and not even know it, until the second one to submit the names discovered that the first already had.
Now you're encouraged to put your info in NFS as you find it, even if you haven't exhausted all the records you plan to search. You can edit and add to the information you've already put in NFS, as you research. But your info being there alerts other people to your interest, so that you can contact each other to share data and coordinate research efforts.
The problem is that as soon as there is enough information on a person to do the ordinance, there is that little green arrow. There are people who cruise NFS just looking for those so they can reserve the name and congratulate themselves for doing family history work. There are consultants who encourage this.
But I don't want my half-finished research submitted to the temple, because when the work is done a new, uneditable record is created, with the temple listed as the submitter. If I made any mistakes, they are now in stone in the temple record.
So, as I'm doing research, I upload the names with what information I have, then I reserve the names. If somebody comes along who is at all interested in the same families I'm researching, I would be happy to share what I've done and what records I still want to look at. They can have the names if they want to do the work.
Posts: 1261 | Registered: Apr 2006
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posted
I'll end on a happy note: When I was teaching the family history class in Sunday School, the week after I taught the class how to use NFS, I asked if anyone had had a problem registering or using the program. One couple said they had a success story and couldn't wait to share it: they thought the husband was the only member in his family, but when they registered and started adding info to NFS, they discovered that his grandfather's name was already in the system, and that somebody had reserved the name. He contacted the submitter, who turned out to be a distant cousin. He willingly removed the reservation, and now they're working together on research. Posts: 1261 | Registered: Apr 2006
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posted
Dad has long insisted that the only purpose of the millenium is to correct all the mistakes made in geneological research and the associated temple work.
I am begining to agree. I see my wife, who will not submit a name without having completed verifiable research, frustrated that all of her carefully researched and submitted information has been "corrected" by a well-meaning individual that is not even a relative. And now she cannot change it.
I am with Pink. Y'all can do all the geneology you want.
Posts: 999 | Registered: Nov 2002
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posted
Pink Floyd, I don't see how cancelling the reserve on your mother's name stops your cousin from going to the temple with the card. Of course, I imagine you plan to be to the temple first with your card.
Posts: 5569 | Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
I can understand the frustration that Pink Floyd and others are having. I'll state that nothing would keep me from making sure my family's temple work is done. Frankly, I don't think Pink Floyd (nor Weeds) would either, especially knowing there was still work out there that needed to be done.
As we work on another batch of names it may be hard to come up with more in the future as I have come to a point where research is much more difficult. It would be easy for me to say I'm done due to frustration in my current situation because there seems little if any to do anyway. I'm guessing this is where you are at Pink Floyd and weeds?
Posts: 5569 | Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
Re: getting permission from living relatives...
My children and I are the only members. My parents are both very much against my having joined. Does this mean I won't be allowed to do any temple work for any of my ancestors until they and their siblings all pass away and I become the next closest living relative?? Or just for family born less than 95 years ago (which is all of as far as I've been able to get so far)?
Posts: 1099 | Registered: Aug 2009
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quote: Pink Floyd, I don't see how cancelling the reserve on your mother's name stops your cousin from going to the temple with the card. Of course, I imagine you plan to be to the temple first with your card.
"Reserve" just kind of puts it on hold and no one else can take it. When the actual form to take to the temple is printed out, it changes to "In Process" and stays that way until the ordinance is completed. When you have it on "reserve" you can go in and make changes as soleil explained. When you put it into "In Process" it is locked up and much harder to change.
quote:Or just for family born less than 95 years ago (which is all of as far as I've been able to get so far)?
That one. If someone is born more than 95 years ago (100 is easier for me to remember,) then you don't need permission from anyone.
Posts: 11533 | Registered: Nov 2000
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posted
I have a similar and perhaps even more frustrating story.
I am the first member in my family (or so I thought) to join the church. My Aunt by trade is geneaoligist, she informs me as she hands me the gedcom for free, that there are some distant relatives that made up first and last names of people she could not find evidence of exsistance. Whats worse is she then continued that they had taken them to that "Temple" and done their work.
So now I have to find the dubious records get something done about them, and try to explain to my Aunt, that most of the time the Family History is done with a great deal of professionalism. Great intro to the Church and one of its most sacred Ordinances for a non-member. Way to go you jerks
My grandfather's work was done in the 80's. I was just flicking through and saw that his father had changed. Someone had taken their relative who had the same first and last name as my grandfather but not his middle name and merged them. There was 3 years difference in their births, they were born in a different county - and country, mine is in Wales their's in England. The mother had the same first name but the father was different and both families had 9 - 10 kids each. The person who has merged them has indicated that his people were married in the same church on the same day as my g-grandparents. It shows my ggfather as a polygamist and my mother to have an additional mother.
I contacted the person who had done it and explained why it was wrong. He basically said he didn't care and waffled on about how important temple work was. When I told him that I did accurate genealogical research and that it was now messed up, he called me arrogant and mocked my 'precious family tree'. I contacted Family Search with my evidence, they said because of the number of people involved - ie 19 kids - and that temple work had been done that shouldn't have been done, it will take months to put right. All from a quick click from someone who didn't do a simple check of the information.
I also thought I had gone back to the 1200's when I found someone on Family Search but after 2 generations I saw someone had merged a family in the US to a British one and it meant that in the mid 1700's the mother was nipping back and forth across the Ocean giving birth to 11 kids in both the UK and the US. It doesn't take a genius to workout that there is something not quite right there.
Lazy, lazy people messing things up. Posts: 340 | Registered: May 2005
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posted
That is precisely why I have issues with collaborative efforts. There are those who just don't care about accuracy. Maybe duplication was better.
Posts: 5569 | Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
I accidentally merged the wrong family when I hit the wrong key. It took me 15 minutes to figure out how to back out of my mistake. The whole time I was panicking. I finally got it fixed. I found out that my grandmother had been taken by a distant relative. As I have never met her or my father, this does not worry me as much as the fact that this person obviously did not ask the immediate family - she has seven children. I wrote a friendly little note saying this woman is my grandmother, but I have gotten no response back. Meanwhile I have a relative born in 1814 who is a direct line ancestor I found, and I wrote to the other person who has her, and he is letting me do the work because he has lots of names and she is a collateral for him. I thought he was very kind, I was not really expecting him to do that.
Posts: 894 | Registered: Jul 2004
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What a wonderful way to view someones work. I realise this is not your words, but the champion name submitters etc do they realise that these names are linked to people? Or are just stepping stones to some Ordinance based brownie program?
quote: most of the time the Family History is done with a great deal of professionalism
How can I break this to you gently? The Church strongly encourages members who have no idea what they’re doing (and in some cases, no desire to learn) to get involved in the work. It’s no wonder the results are mixed. But for all the horror stories and tangled knots, there are some fabulous things coming out of the efforts of total amateurs. For example, the indexing project which you can learn more about here.
The real problem with collaborative efforts is that some people don’t know how to work together with any measure of charity for each other’s mistakes. In some ways, the forced collaboration of NFS is long overdue – in other ways, we are far from ready for it.
posted
The end result should be that duplication is substantially reduced and errors addressed. In Family History, it should be the quality of the data that is paramount, not the quantity.
I would personally prefer it if there was some better indication of disputed information being resolved. My MIL had a completely unrelated family spliced into her genealogy by some person unknown, where the documentary evidence is unequivocal that the Cozens are nothing to do with the Paskes other than having lived in the same village. I have done what I can to ensure that the purported relationship is not visible on New Family Search but it is still there in the background. Knowing that the erroneous link would be removed after checking would be a great improvement.
Posts: 1461 | Registered: Oct 2008
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posted
I just explored the new program for the first time recently. Amazingly, I found G.Grandpa and his wife. I KNOW it is they. But her name is recorded in a way that I have never seen it before. I did not have time to go into my paper documents (don't even know what storage bin to look in)at that time, and I fully intend to try and communicate with whomever is out there who registered these relatives. I am really curious what documents they used since I have the only genealogical records/documents the direct and only descendants own. I am the sole member in my family that can do temple work. ( I lie, the kids can baptise) The numbers of people that need to be found and worked for are overwhelming. I am glad there is someone out there that is doing something for my kindred dead. I am to the point that I don't care who does the work -as long as it is done correctly. But I still feel really intimidated to write a stranger and ask whay they named my great grandmother like they did when the family papers never use that name. It may be her formal name was rather different than her everyday name. Not unusual at all in the Benelux region. But to refuse to write back?? refuse to cooperate?? your stories are making me cringe.
Posts: 5468 | Registered: Jun 2002
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quote:I am the sole member in my family that can do temple work. ( I lie, the kids can baptise) The numbers of people that need to be found and worked for are overwhelming. I am glad there is someone out there that is doing something for my kindred dead. I am to the point that I don't care who does the work -as long as it is done correctly.
Well, if you ever get some blue cards, ship me a few, and I'll fer sure do them.
I no longer enter the temple with my "I bet this name's been done as many times as Elvis" chip on my shoulder (life is too short to be mad in the temple--one should save all one's anger for the freeway).
I decided that the temple must be a blessing and spiritual experience for its very own sake (well, DUH!).
Nevertheless, I would be very happy indeed to know for a certainty that I did the work first for someone.
Posts: 8601 | Registered: Sep 2002
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posted
My Dad was showing me the name merge feature. At the time it looked like a great feature, at least if used responsibly.
Seems to me that if a person wants to combine names the system should attempt to reconcile the existing relationships and if there's cause for concern, warn the user. In fact seems to me that various concerns could be rated and the warning could go from possible error to high probability of error (please submit documentation supporting request).
Cause for concern would include spouses that have overlapping life spans when no divorce is recorded. Spatial anomalies when it comes to children being born (e.g. having children born in multiple countries requiring moving back and forth in a short amount of time). And any other anomaly that can be quantified.
Posts: 10855 | Registered: Oct 2004
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posted
All this talk scares me off new family search even more despite doing all i could since the age of 16. my parents aren't even down as being sealed and i know they were because i did the work
so i guess the Lord knows its been done and other work that doesn't seem to be recognised either - sorry but why on earth did the church try and fix what wasn't even broken?? sure it wasn't perfect but NFS seems to be creating more problems since. bring back the good old forms i say!!!!
Posts: 66 | Registered: Sep 2009
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posted
The Church's efforts are well meaning. Many have complained about duplication. New Family Search wouldn't be so bad if people just did what was right.
Posts: 5569 | Registered: Sep 2001
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posted
Does anyone know if there is a limit to how long you can reserve a person's temple work online?
Should I print it out even though I know it may be awhile before I can do it?
I don't want to be wearing Pink Floyd's shoes and feeling his frustration if some distant relative or even non-relative does work that I want to see to.
Posts: 621 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
It is supposed to be forever. However, because of some of the problems discussed in this thread, there is a move afoot to make it 3 years and then it would automatically go back to "waiting for ordinances."
Posts: 11533 | Registered: Nov 2000
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posted
Regardless of who's doing what temple work, here are words from Elder Boyd K Packer to live by...
quote: Family history work has the power to do something for the dead. It has an equal power to do something to the living. Family history work of Church members has a refining, spiritualizing, tempering influence on those who are engaged in it. They understand that they are tying their family together, their living family here with those who have gone before.
Family history work in one sense would justify itself even if one were not successful in clearing names for temple work. The process of searching, the means of going after those names, would be worth all the effort you could invest. The reason: You cannot find names without knowing that they represent people. You begin to find out things about people. When we research our own lines we become interested in more than just names or the number of names going through the temple. Our interest turns our hearts to our fathers—we seek to find them and to know them and to serve them.
quote: If the person was born in the last 95 years, then the submitter is supposed to get permission from the closest living relative (defined as first the spouse, then adult child, then parent, then sibling.)
I'm one who for the most part doesn't even care whose family I do work for. I wouldn't want to do work for someone if their family cared, but I have always figured that in the end it will all be done so it doesn't matter much what I do personally.
I do understand though. I'm just think of my great grandma for whom I was baptized for on my 12th birthday. I never really knew my grandma (she died when I was 1). My great grandma always seemed like my grandma. She even lived in our home for a time just before she died. She was special to me.
So it's interesting how this is all playing out. She died when I was 10. It's a long story, but it was a process of taking her name through. One of the problems we had was that my mom was denied having great grandma's name ready because she had to get permission from "her closest living relative". My mom was her closest living relative, but she didn't fit the definition above. I would have been very sad, not to be able to do her work because mom was only a grandchild.
I would have had an even harder time if her name had been reserved by a distant relative when I had been looking forward to doing her baptism for so long.
Posts: 4944 | Registered: Sep 2002
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posted
Really, I have great sympathy with the concerns people have when they discover that someone else has been doing the work for relations that they wanted to do themselves. I have been there, and it is galling. I got quite upset about it.
However, what we must remember is that the work is for the dead who are unable to go through these ordinances themselves. The critical point is that the work gets done for them, not that we get to do it. If they have had the work done for them, it is a good thing and it is the only thing that matters. Our own feelings need to be set aside.
I have much more sympathy with people that are worried that reserving names is preventing work from being done. That is a real issue, to my way of thinking.
Posts: 1461 | Registered: Oct 2008
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posted
I have to admit that I reserved some of my family members, namely my grandparents, simply because I know that two of my aunts are absolutely opposed to their work being done. In this way, someone else can't come along and do their work while I am waiting for my aunts to change their minds or while I am waiting for the time to pass.
Posts: 894 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote: In this way, someone else can't come along and do their work while I am waiting for my aunts to change their minds or while I am waiting for the time to pass.
I think the difference would be that, should someone attempt to communicate with you about them, you would explain why you have reserved the names. Plus, you are a closer relative.
I think the biggest problem that most people are having is that some distant relative (or even a complete non-relative) is reserving names, and then not responding to communications regarding their reservations. Or responding in an entirely inappropriate manner.
Posts: 8601 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:The critical point is that the work gets done for them, not that we get to do it. If they have had the work done for them, it is a good thing and it is the only thing that matters. Our own feelings need to be set aside.
That may be true for long dead relatives scruffydog, but no one should be required to sit up until midnight on the one year anniversary of their sisters death to reserve their name to do the work so some distant relative doesn't swoop in and steal it at 12:02. Or to check on their mothers reservation every few weeks to make sure some distant relative hasn't uploaded a single GEDCOM entry on her and stolen the opportunity from her children.
The rules are there for a reason. Just because they cannot be enforced doesn't give you license to break them. No matter what the justification.
I agree there is a right way and a wrong way of doing things. I dont think the important work mentions walking all over other peoples feelings to get it done, especially willing and assisting people. We have had people here rattle on that any sort of publication to do with the Church has had the Prophet and therefore the Lords consent. I find it interesting that people call for turning a blind eye to the rules on one of most sacred things.
edit: not directed at us Navooudels (I think I spelt it right), I have also run into this elsewhere.
posted
uh oh brand new concept here and not a happy one either... It never occurred to me that my children have to ask all the non- members (mostly atheists/unspiritual/anti church) in the family (EVERYONE else but me) for permission to do the family geneology work. The kids are all excited about gathering the records to baptise at the next temple day--I cannot imagine they will be as excited to contact a boodle of semi-strangers to ask permission first. (I can't even imagine asking my own mother if I can work for her parents. I didn't ask her about Dad either.) It isn't any skin off the living relations noses one way or the other. If someone demanded to be unworked for personally, that's something I would honor ( with huge regrets) but I can just imagine the celestial pissé if a waiting soul's second cousin once removed ( or worse anti social sibling) got all anti mormon and the waiting soul had to wait 99 years for the blessings...
Seriously? What happens if patrons just go ahead and do the work privately, sincerely, reverently, but without permission?( envisioning a visit from the geneology police.)
What if I hold my counsel and let the kids do their family? I am not going to the third ring of the Kingdom anyway so I think it's more important to get the work done than spend lots of time talking about it. WHowh, now I have the guilts ABOUT DOING TEMPLE WORK! Gees. Who would thunk it.
Posts: 5468 | Registered: Jun 2002
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quote:Seriously? What happens if patrons just go ahead and do the work privately, sincerely, reverently, but without permission?( envisioning a visit from the geneology police.)
Nothing.
Unless they were part of the Holocaust.
Or are Jewish.
Or are Catholic.
Then you run the risk of offending those who are checking for such things. Regularly. Then they jump all over the Church for baptizing their dead relatives.
But other than that, go ahead.
Posts: 11533 | Registered: Nov 2000
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All the more reason to add a how are you related checkbox as you suggested earlier, PF. Because, I'm hoping the church takes the stand, we are not going to remove the work for any ancestor that was done by a direct descendant.
Posts: 10855 | Registered: Oct 2004
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quote:It never occurred to me that my children have to ask all the non- members (mostly atheists/unspiritual/anti church) in the family (EVERYONE else but me) for permission to do the family geneology work.
Do they have to ask them all? I thought one just had to ask permission from the closest living relative. For example, when I did my Grandmother and Grandfather's work, I had permission from my uncle (their oldest living child). At that point, I felt justified in doing the work for them, and their one child who has passed away.
Just to be polite (or so I may have mistakenly thought), I obtained the permission of their other living children. I didn't think that I had to do that, but maybe I am mistaken. The second round of asking was a very nice experience for me, but that is neither here nor there.
Posts: 8601 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:Seriously? What happens if patrons just go ahead and do the work privately, sincerely, reverently, but without permission?( envisioning a visit from the geneology police.)
Then that one woman temple work tattle crew will pick up her hotline to channel 4 and the Salt Lake Tribune to tattle on you.
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