The question of oral sex in LDS marriage: Part 2

There’s more to say about the mysterious 1982 letter on oral sex from the First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

There is no way to view the original document. It cannot be retrieved from LDS Church Headquarters without proper authorization. A copy of the letter can be found online, but be aware that this letter was not intended to be released to the public and any copies found may have been doctored. Most importantly, it was never canonized as any kind of scripture.


After analyzing a more complete copy of the letter that is being circulated, it is my personal conclusion that the letter itself may have been tampered with.

Grammatically the whole sentence starting with “The First Presidency has interpreted…” seems to come out of nowhere. It reads too much like it was added after the fact. The very next sentence “If a person is engaged in…” picks up like the previous one never existed. The whole document is structurally congruent except for that one sentence.

Another inconsistency that I observed was that the sentence right before “The First Presidency has interpreted…” emphasizes to the leaders to give “counseling without going into clinical detail”, and then the very next sentence jumps right into a very intimate, clinical detail. It was a very jarring contradiction. As I was reading it, I was hearing that Sesame Street song going through my head – “One of these things is not like the other, c’mon now, can you tell which one?”

When dealing with apocryphal documents of this sort being circulated, one thing that we have to keep in mind is the example of the missing 116 pages from the Book of Lehi. The 116 pages of translation were stolen while in the possession of Martin Harris. This account can be found in the book “Our Heritage: A Brief History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints” on page 8.

Joseph Smith was commanded by God not to re-translate those pages. Now that they were potentially in the hands of those that wanted to destroy the church, they could be manipulated in a way that would be used to discredit the work that Joseph Smith had done. (Doctrine and Covenants 10:10-12) Since this letter has been circulated on the Internet by questionable sources, I have to conclude that a similar situation could exist in this case. Manipulating the letter with today’s technology would be easy to do.

Even if I’m wrong, there are other factors to consider here. After reading this letter, my memory was jogged to another inconsistency. If oral sex in marriage was even a minor sin, President Kimball (who’s shown as having signed the letter) would have mentioned it in “The Miracle of Forgiveness.”

Spencer W. Kimball was the champion of the law of chastity in the 70’s and 80’s. If President Kimball felt that oral sex in marriage was immoral, unnatural, unholy or impure in any degree, why wouldn't he spell it out in his book.

It was not in his book, nor is the denouncement of oral sex in marriage found in any Church Conference talk anywhere, at any time.

Reason causes me to conclude that the part of the letter that says, “The First Presidency has interpreted oral sex as constituting an unnatural, impure and unholy practice.” is suspect, to say the least, and thus cannot be taken as official Church doctrine on the subject.

For those who may want more historical background on the “oral sex” letter and what happened afterward, as well as the Church’s current stand on sexual practices in marriage, this link gives good clarification:
https://www.dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V25N01_51.pdf

This is an article written by Romel Mackelprang, a former professor at BYU and Eastern Washington University. His article talks about a follow up letter that was sent by the first presidency that essentially rescinds the first.

“A question I have frequently been asked concerns the propriety of
oral sex. To address this question, one must first define the term. Is
kissing oral sex? How about a mouth on a breast? Or is oral sex lim-
ited exclusively to oral-genital contact? (These questions have special
significance for disabled persons who are paralyzed and lack sensation
in their genitals, arms, and legs and for whom sexual expression is
very different from that of able-bodied persons. For some, their mouths
may be the only means of active sexual expression.) On 5 January
1982, apparently in response to numerous queries about oral sex, the
First Presidency distributed a letter (signed by Spencer W. Kimball,
N. Eldon Tanner, Marion G. Romney, and Gordon B. Hinkley) to
bishops and stake presidents. In it, they characterized oral sex as
impure. However, the letter specifically stated that Church leaders
were not to discuss intimate sexual matters with members. The letter
was also not to be shared with the general Church membership. Appar-
ently, a number of the local leaders read the first part of the letter but
ignored the second, choosing instead to delve into their members' inti-
mate lives. After the 1982 letter, several of my clients and a number of
friends reported experiences in which their bishops or stake presidents
inquired into their intimate sex lives. Some reported local leaders using
Church meetings to counsel members about sexual practices. Almost
all of the inquiries and counsel dealt specifically with oral sex. As a
result of these intrusions, many members wrote letters to Church lead-
ers, protesting ecclesiastical meddling. Apparently, in response to these
reactions, on 15 October 1982, a second letter was sent to stake and
ward leaders that reiterated the January 5 directive to avoid inquiring
into couples' intimate sexual practices. Further, it directed leaders that,
even if asked by members about specific sexual matters in marriage,
they were to avoid giving direct counsel. The latest directive, in the
"Instructions for Issuing Recommends to Enter a Temple" (1989),
instructs interviewers to ask only, "Do you live the law of chastity?"
They are further counseled:
When interviewing an applicant for a recommend, do not inquire into personal,
intimate matters about marital relations between a husband and his wife. Gener-
ally, do not deviate from the recommend interview questions. If, during an inter-
view, an applicant asks about the propriety of specific conduct do not pursue the
matter. Merely suggest that if the applicant has enough anxiety about the propri-
ety of conduct to ask about it, the best course would be to discontinue it. If you
are sensitive and wise, you usually can prevent those being interviewed from
asking such explicit questions.”

This concurs with my belief and understanding of the Church’s current position on sexual practices in marriage - including oral sex. I would especially recommend reading pages 60-61 of the article, entitled “And They Shall Be One Flesh: Sexuality and Contemporary Mormonism.”