When I was looking a various genealogy resources online a few weeks ago, I came across a web site that is maintained by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I later found out that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints maintains the largest genealogical research library in the world.
Today, I decided to look into why genealogical research is so important to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I have cousins that belong to the Church, and I am interested in learning about how our family history is important to their faith. What I discovered is that the Church has not been around as long as many of the other major religions of the world. Many of the ancestors of the Latter-Day Saints lived in a time before the Church came into existence in 1830.
The founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was born approximately an hour away from where I live. Until today, I had no idea who Joseph Smith was. I had only seen signs pointing towards his birthplace in Lebanon, New Hampshire. The Church was not founded in Lebanon, though. The Smith family had moved to Palmyra New York before that beautiful spring day in 1820 when young Joseph had a conversation with God that changed his life, and the lives of many others, forever.
The Church teaches its members that all saving ordinances such as baptisms and sealings are performed on earth on behalf of the dead. Latter-Day Saints serve as proxies for their deceased relatives in temple ceremonies for these ordinances. Members of the Church take their obligation to perform temple ordinances on behalf of their ancestors seriously, as these ceremonies provide a means for families to be sealed together for eternity so that marriages and families can continue beyond this lifetime. It is no surprise, then, that members of the Church devote a substantial amount of time and energy to genealogical research so that they may identify ancestors for whom they can perform temple ordinances. This noble work has resulted in the collection of large amounts of genealogical information by the Church, and the Church shares the information with the public through the Family Search web site and the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah.