QUESTION: Do we not
believe that as celestialized beings we will have spirit children?
ANSWER: Well, I read that
in the Doctrine and Covenants 132.
QUESTION: Are there not
other beings already celestialized who are having spirit children?
ANSWER: Let me answer that
I believe that my Father in heaven is a celestialized being and that he may
have some spiritual children that I do not know about. It is possible also that
there are others who have but the Lord has not revealed any details on that.
QUESTION: Are these
spiritual children of other celestialized beings, the inhabitants of other
worlds?
ANSWER: That is possible.
QUESTION: Are they then
the grandchildren, great-grandchildren, etc. of God, our Father; it is possible
that we are the spiritual children of some other celestial being, or were we
created by God; and are we the first generation, or are we the third or fourth
generation?
ANSWER: If you become familiar
with the literature of the Church and read it, you will find that Orson Pratt
preached a sermon on this subject and answered most of these questions. Orson Pratt
presented a point of view based on a passage from Section 76 of the Doctrine
and Covenants, which says that [“they] are begotten sons and daughters unto
God.” (D
& C 76:24.) He preached an entire sermon pointing out from the
standpoint of reason that it might be reasonable that children living on other
worlds and so forth would not be literally the spiritual children of our Father
in Heaven but would be spiritual children of other Gods. But since all of these
Gods were tied in with the patriarchal order of things they would all still be
children of our Father in heaven. Here in mortality I am the child of my father
and I am also the child of my grandfather. My name is Clark. My father’s name
was Edwin and his father’s name was Joshua. Do I belong to Joshua Clark’s
family? Yes, I do. Orson Pratt used this same kind of reasoning.
. . .
President Joseph F. Smith stated
that our Father in heaven does have children on other worlds, that other worlds
are peopled by his children, but that is about as far as I understand we can go
with the problem and we had better leave it there, I think. (James R. Clark, “Prophets
and Problems of the Pearl of Great Price,” 33rd Annual Leadership Week,
BYU Extension Division, 1956, pp. 67, 70)