The Temple Endowment
 

"The Temple Endowment, as administered in modern temples, comprises instruction relating to the significance and sequence of past dispensations, and the importance of the present as the greatest and grandest era in human history.  This course of instruction includes a recital of the most prominent events of the creative period, the condition of our first parents in the Garden of Eden, their disobedience and consequent expulsion from that blissful abode, their condition in the lone and dreary world when doomed to live by labor and sweat, the plan of redemption by which the great transgression may be atoned, the period of the great apostasy, the restoration of the Gospel with all its ancient powers and privileges, the powers and indispensable condition of personal purity and devotion to the right in present life, and a strict compliance with Gospel requirements....
 

"The ordinances of the endowment embody certain obligations on the part of the individual, such as covenant and promise to observe the law of strict virtue and chastity, to be charitable, benevolent, tolerant and pure; to devote both talent and material means to the spread of truth and the uplifting of the race; to maintain devotion to the cause of truth and the uplifting of the race; to maintain devotion to the cause of truth; and to seek in every way to contribute to the great preparation that the earth may be made ready to receive her King, -the Lord Jesus Christ.  With the taking of each covenant and the assuming of each obligation a promised blessing is pronounced, contingent upon the faithful observance of the conditions.

"No jot, iota, or tittle of the temple rites is otherwise than uplifting and sanctifying.  In every detail the endowment ceremony contributes to covenants of morality of life, consecration of person to high ideals, devotion to truth, patriotism to nation, and allegiance to God.  The blessings of the House of the Lord are restricted to no privileged class; every member of the Church may have admission to the temple with the right to participate in the ordinances thereof, if he comes duly accredited as of worthy life and conduct."  (James E. Talmage, The House of the Lord [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Company, 1968], pp. 83-84).

When entering the temple, one should wear modest clothing.  A dress with sleeves is suitable.  Certainly after receiving the endowment, your wardrobe should be modest, whether worn in the temple or not.  Pants are not appropriate for a young woman to wear to the temple. 

People who enter the temple to be married or to participate in other sacred ordinances change from their everyday clothes to plain, clean, white clothing.  Elder Hugh B. Brown suggested the reason for this:

"Here we will not only lay aside the clothing of the street, but the thoughts of the street, and will try not only to clothe our bodies in clean white linen but our minds in purity of thought.  May we profit by the spoken word and what is more lasting and more impressive, receive instruction from the Spirit." (as quoted by Christiansen, "Some things you need to know about the temple," p. 26)

"In the temples all are dressed alike in white.  White is the symbol of purity.  No unclean person has the right to enter God's house.  Besides, the uniform dress symbolizes that before God our Father in Heaven, all men are equal.  The beggar and the banker, the learned and the unlearned, the prince and the pauper sit side by side in the temple and are of equal importance if they live righteously before the Lord God, the Father of their spirits.  It is spiritual fitness and understanding that one receives in the temple.  All such have an equal place before the Lord."  (Widstoe, "Looking Toward the Temple," p. 58)

"The ordinances of the temple are so sacred that they are not open to the view of the public.  They are available only to those who qualify through righteous living.  They are performed in places dedicated especially for this purpose.  Their sacred nature is such that discussion in detail outside the temple is inappropriate.

"Many blessings come to those who receive and respect these sacred ordinances, which are so necessary for exaltation.  Participation in temple work provides dynamic, vivid, useful instruction in gospel principles, and the temple is a place for contemplation and prayer.

"The temple is a sanctuary from the world, a bit of heaven on earth, and one should continue to live worthily so that he can go to the temple often and renew his covenants." (Christiansen, "Some things you need to know about the temple")