Married Name of Non-Member Wife

I have a new member asking why LDS Tools uses his non-member wife's maiden name and not her married last name. Can the married last name of a non-member wife be entered so that that her married last name is listed in LDS Tools? If not. please provide an explanation so that I can help this new member understand. As of now he is feeling like the church only recognizes temple marriages by not allowing a non-member spouse to be listed in the ward phone directory (LDS Tools) by her legal married name.

The clerk should be able to change her preferred name, as well as her household name in LCR.

pwilcoxson wrote:I have a new member asking why LDS Tools uses his non-member wife's maiden name and not her married last name.

For members, the name is pulled from their membership record. For non-member spouses, the name is pulled from the marriage record of the member. Typically the maiden name is used when recording a marriage, but this might be a good reason to record the married name.

Typically, the non-member spouse is the husband, so there isn't an issue with married/maiden name. So this is different.

You might want to look in the help section of LCR to see what it suggests.

drepouille wrote:The clerk should be able to change her preferred name, as well as her household name in LCR.

Unless something has changed, the preferred name only applies to members or member of record. The household name is shared with the husband.

russellhltn wrote:For members, the name is pulled from their membership record. For non-member spouses, the name is pulled from the marriage record of the member. Typically the maiden name is used when recording a marriage, but this might be a good reason to record the married name.

LCR specifically says that the maiden name should be entered. That makes sense since that information should eventually make it's way into Family Search where you definitely want the maiden name.

But in this situation it causes a problem since they decided to show non-member spouses in the directory and LDS Tools. They could display the household name instead of the maiden name but then they would wrong for those women who do not take their husband's name. I think the only reliable situation would be to add a preferred name for non-member spouses.

pwilcoxson wrote:As of now he is feeling like the church only recognizes temple marriages by not allowing a non-member spouse to be listed in the ward phone directory (LDS Tools) by her legal married name.

I would submit feedback to both LDS Tools (inside the app) and LCR describing the problem and the hurt feelings it is causing. But even if the decision makers agree that they should use the household name or add a preferred name it will take time for any change to occur. In the mean time I would first let the member know that this isn't about temple marriages because civil marriages between church members do not have this problem. It's probably more because the church tries to minimize information they retain about non-members because of privacy laws in many countries. In the past the maiden name was sufficient for the marriage record but because they tried to use that information in a new way, they encountered unanticipated issues that they haven't had time to fix. That isn't an official statement (I'm just another clerk and have no special connections) but it's my educated guess.

In addition to the advice above, I'd call local unit support to get their input. Maybe they have a trick up their sleeve.

At minimum, they should be able to suppress the record so she doesn't show at all. But that may not make the couple any happier. (But it does show that they have more tools than are available at the local unit level.)

Oh boy. Clerks, clerks, clerks. You're clearly in the right calling by your attention to detail, but there's a spirit of the law you need to also observe...

All the recommendations above, except for one, do more harm than good ... the acceptable solutions are that you either tell them to get over it (incidentally, not acceptable), or get her baptized (incidentally, a *bad* reason to get baptized)? In many cases the mere suggestion is more likely to end up with a DECREASE in people getting baptized due to them taking a very justifiable offense. I mean the worst thing you can tell them is that their marriage is so unimportant that 6 years after this glitch was brought up here (this thread was started 6 years ago) the program still seems to suggest that their marriage doesn't count. Explaining to them "why" will not make it better.

There are better ways of dealing with this problem, and it starts with valuing the person above the value of the record. One should consider that these aren't the 1800's ... there are tons of records showing every person's maiden name in the 2000's.

And if you play your cards right with the part-member family (ie. that means you value their membership ABOVE perfection in this part of the record - a record which, by the way, is routinely wrong for many families in every single ward for all kinds of reasons, and many, maybe most, never get fixed, and yet the church is still true) ... if you value their membership and do the right thing BY THEM by putting their needs first, then there will probably be children of that family that will be rooted in the gospel as they mature and raise children and grandchildren in the gospel ... a child or grandchild will fix it when that parent dies. They will. But they won't be there to do that if you value the perfection of their particular record more than the membership of the people who's record that represents. Bah, who cares, you got the record right and that's what counts. Right? No. The Lord cares more about the individual.

When dealing with such matters let's not put the cart in front of the horse. People matter more than records. Baptism and fellowship is more important than getting a maiden name record perfect ... especially when you're working on raising a generation that will stay in the church and fix obvious errors when they see it in a genealogical record some day in the far future. As for myself I've made myself to fix it when the spouse gets baptized ... which I'm feeling confident because we're doing right BY HER.

davea0511 wrote: Wed Mar 08, 2023 5:09 pm Oh boy. Clerks, clerks, clerks. You're clearly in the right calling by your attention to detail, but there's a spirit of the law you need to also observe...

Please note that this forum is not an official suggestion box. It's primarily user-to-user support. The clerk's ability to satisfy the request is limited by the provided computer system they have to use. We're just trying to help them understand the options available.

davea0511 wrote: Wed Mar 08, 2023 5:09 pm Oh boy. Clerks, clerks, clerks. You're clearly in the right calling by your attention to detail, but there's a spirit of the law you need to also observe...

Please be respectful of others here. Maybe it wasn't meant to be but this comment comes across as condescending and it doesn't help you make your point.

It sensitive situations like this, I don't try to give recommendations. I know that I don't know the people or situation well enough to do that. I just try to give information so the original poster (and their priesthood leaders) can make an informed decision. I feel that my post did that. I do stand by my one actual recommendation to send feedback.

But I'll freely admit that other information may also be valuable. I don't really disagree with your points and I think they are a useful addition to this thread. But please be respectful and don't use sarcasm.