Personal Stories

Why I left

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My Story Death of Reason and Freedom A Question Charlene's Story

My Story

If you've been hanging around cyberspace awhile, like me, and frequent places like RfM you've probably seem me around. I used to be Koriwhore on RfM, but have not been contributing to that forum for about a year. I've moved on to PostMormon.org, which is far more civil and less snide and cynical. It has it's fair share of criticism, and critical thinking, but it's just not deeply committed to enabling a victim mentality, the way I think RfM is. It's more aimed at providing support for those going through the difficult process of disengaging from Mormonism, which is something I've been trying to do for the better part of a decade. According to my therapist, I need to shrink the relevance of Mormonism in my life.

Over on PostMormon.org, I've dropped the "whore" from Koriwhore and now I'm just Kori.

The reason I chose the name Koriwhore in the first place was because over the years since my awakening to reality, I've come to identify more and more with the secular humanist character of "Korihor" in the Book of Mormon, whom Joseph's Myth obviously modeled after Thomas Paine, (the author of "Common Sense" and "The Age of Reason") who was the inspiration for Jefferson, Adams and Franklin (all of whom embodied the humanist enlightenment principles to which I can only aspire) when they collaborated on the Declaration of Independence. Koriwhore is the most reasonable character in all of scripture and presents an existentialist philosophy on a par with Fredrich Nietzsche's Zarathustra, who is another one of my intellectual and spiritual heroes. Korihor also seems a whole lot like another one of my heroes from Mormon history, William Law, who was apparently the one man in Nauvoo with a shred of integrity in the 1840's, and was responsible for seeing to it that Joseph's Myth got exposed for what he was, an adulterer and a fraud, which led to a whole series of events that culminated in Joseph's death, unfortunately, before he was brought to justice for his serious crimes.

I started out at a relatively realistic and well educated TBM, mostly defending the faith on the internet, first at Alt.Religion.Mormonism, which is totally unmoderated and ends up being completely contentious, hostile and just plain nutty. Thankfully somebody over there told me about New Order Mormons, which was like a breath of fresh air for me. I couldn't believe there was actually a place where people spoke honestly about the doctrines I had problems with, mainly racism, but also all other forms of bigotry that I found to be a complete contradiction of Christ's commandment to love our fellow man (and presumably women) as ourselves.

Personally I'm a BIG believer in the concept that relationships are far more important than religion, any religion.

I've been officially out of the Mormon church since 9-11-02, exactly a year after my faith was shattered by the events of 9-11, which convinced me that the god I believed in prior to 9-11, the loving interventionist great white gawd / "Father in Heaven" of Mormonism, didn't really exist.

If he had, he would have intervened to prevent the senseless death of 3,000 innocent people on 9/11.

I had one question after 9-11, "Where was god?" I went to listen to the man I considered to be the prophet of god at the time, Gordon B. Hinkley and he had nothing meaningful to say, at all.

I told this to a former missionary companion of mine who wanted all the details of my departure. He said, "Well, what did you expect him to say in response to 9-11?"

How about something, anything, meaningful? How about anything to put this in perspective? How about, we're not alone. God is in charge. God knows why this happened, even though we may not understand the ways of God.

But no, nothing. He was completely devoid of anything meaningful to say after 9-11. When I turned to him or to god, I felt like I was looking into an abyss.

The real confirmation for me was the General Conference following 9-11, where GBH just seemed morally ambivalent about the war against those who carried out 9-11. What kind of a prophet is morally ambivalent? Where's the righteous indignation? Where's the fire and brimstone, the doomsday predictions, the call to repentance like you'd expect from a real prophet? Instead he expressed his disappointment in the direction the youth were headed in and his response was to demand that women limit their earrings to one per ear and men should have no earrings and neither should have tattoos.

"OMG! Here 3,000 innocent people have just been senselessly killed by religious fanatics and God's biggest concern is fashion accessories?"

That just seemed like the most trivial and superficial thing a prophet could have said in light of the state of humanity.

To me it became apparent in light of the events of 9-11 that religion was used to dehumanize others in order to justify inhumanity and self preservation. What I witnessed on 9-11 was the most barbaric kind of tribalism and religion was a major part of the inhumanity. I had to seriously question my religious beliefs after 9-11 as a former Muslim and convert to Mormonism. I rejected religion after 9-11.

I felt like Ellie Weisel in "Night" when he witnessed the execution of an angelic child during the holocaust and believed that he'd just witnessed the execution of god.

For the first time in my life Nihilism seemed more tenable than my previous world view.

Fortunately for me that hopeless state of dark, hopeless despair didn't last long.

From the smoldering ashes of 9-11 heroes started emerging.

Common men and women who knew full well that there was a good chance they'd be sacrificing their lives as they went into the smoldering ruins of ground zero. Undeterred, they went in anyway, simply because they loved their fellow men and women.

They cared more about rescuing their fallen comrades than they did about preserving their own lives. That was one of the most beautiful and ironic moments I've ever witnessed.

I recognized that bravery and courage. It was the same kind of humanity I'd seen on the faces of the men who stormed the beaches of Normandy, knowing full well there was a good chance they wouldn't survive, but that their sacrifice was worth securing freedom from tyranny.

I realized after 9-11 that we were alone in this world to solve the problems we'd created, which was a little terrifying at first. For the first time in my life I had this overwhelming feeling that there was no God who was going to intervene on our behalf.

If we were going to overcome the worst aspects of ourselves, it was up to us to do so, individually and collectively. We each had a choice to make, am I going to be governed by the worst aspects of myself, fear, hatred and dogma that leads to the kind of inhumanity of 9-11, the holocaust and MMM or am I going to be governed by the best aspects of my self, compassion, love, conscience, respect, responsibility and common human decency?

I knew what choice I had to make. Not only for my own good, but for the good of my children and of future generations and civilization and the evolution of mankind.

In the interest of survival, I had to reject anything barbaric, tribal and unkind.

Years later, recently in fact, I found this, message from the Dali Lama in response to 9-11.

"Today the human soul asks the question: What can I do to preserve the beauty and the wonder of our world and to eliminate the anger and hatred-and the disparity that inevitably causes it - in that part of the world which I touch? Please seek to answer that question today, with all the magnificence that is You.

What can you do TODAY...this very moment? A central teaching in most spiritual traditions is: What you wish to experience, provide for another. Look to see, now, what it is you wish to experience - in your own life, and in the world. Then see if there is another for whom you may be the source of that.

If you wish to experience peace, provide peace for another. If you wish to know that you are safe, cause another to know that they are safe. If you wish to better understand seemingly incomprehensible things, help another to better understand. If you wish to heal your own sadness or anger, seek to heal the sadness or anger of another.

Those others are waiting for you now. They are looking to you for guidance, for help, for courage, for strength, for understanding, and for assurance at this hour. Most of all, they are looking to you for love. My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness."

That works for me. That's the kind of thing I would expect a real prophet to say, but this guy doesn't even claim to be a prophet.

Like the Dali Lama, my religion is very simple, my religion is kindness.

Now I can answer that question for myself and for my children, "Where was God on 9-11?"

God was in the hearts of those who responded out of love for their fellow man. God is love. Love is divine. We're all kindred people. We're in this together. This is the only world we've got and its not up to God to save us, it's up to us, each one of us individually.

It's like Carl Sagan said here

"Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity -- in all this vastness -- there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us. It's been said that astronomy is a humbling, and I might add, a character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known. "

and like Einstein said here

"A human being is part of a whole called by us "Universe", a part limited in space and time. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest - a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison to us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive."

Carl Sagan, again, "A religion that stressed the magnificence of the universe as revealed by modern science, might be able to draw forth reserves of reverence and awe hardly tapped by traditional faiths. Sooner or later, such a religion will emerge."

And Christopher Hitchens, "Consider for just a moment what it means to be the first generation to receive the images we've received from the Hubbel Space Telescope and to unravel the human genetic code. The awe, wonder and meaning you derive from considering the implication of those two things for just a moment in time, will prove more profoundly powerful than what you could derive from a lifetime of considering the simplistic fairy tale myths of religion." from his lecture on "The Moral Necessity of Atheism"

That works for me.

It's like Einstein's friend, Max Planck said, after Einstein's General Theory of Relativity was proven by an astronomy experiment 17 years after he developed the theory, "You have never doubted what the result would be, but it is beneficial, nonetheless, if now this fact is indubitably established for others as well. The intimate union between the beautiful, the true and the real has again been proven."

This for me is a much more tenable and useful world view than the one I inherited and hopefully it will serve me and my children and future generations well as a guide for their lives, how to interact with their fellow men and respect themselves, life, and the lives of their fellow men and other life forms and the source of life, nature, in all its forms.

If not, then hopefully they will at least free their minds from the mental slavery of dogmatism in the free thought tradition of great men like Socrates, Plato, Lao Tsu, Copernicus, Newton, Darwin, Paine, Jefferson, Lincoln, Spinoza, Nietzsche, Einstein, Sagan, Dawkins, Harris and Hitchins.

Although I consider myself more of a pantheist than an atheist, I tend to identify with the natural world view currently being described by guys like Hitchens, Dawkins and Harris far more than any theist (supernatural) world view I've been exposed to, although I'm not as convinced as those three that religion is as evil as they claim it is.

But I do agree with them that religion, like all other forms of tribalism, does far more harm than good because it actually inhibits progress and the evolution of mankind by conserving the anachronistic traditions we inherited, long past their usefulness.

Mormon racism, homophobia and misogyny make a great case in point.

They do far more to dehumanize others than they do to accomplish the kindness Christ commanded.

Any kind of elitist, patriarchal, caste system, like Mormonism, violates Christ's main commandment to us, to love our fellow man as ourselves.

We're all kin, kindred people, the same kind, genial spirits, genius, 99.9% genetically identical, yet somehow we still manage to blow that .1% that makes us superficially different, completely out of proportion and wage war over it, over and over again, endlessly and we're running out of time for devoting our precious resources to destroying ourselves and our planet instead of progressing, nurturing and healing the true source of our sustenance, nature and our living, breathing planet.

If we, individually and collectively, simply remember what the Dali Lama claims humanity has forgotten, that, "We are all one." we can realize the authentic utopian dream, here, now, in real life, realizing our authentic connection to each other and to the larger universe/nature/cosmos.

The Death of Reason and Freedom

ORIGINS

I was born into the church by parents whose lineage goes back to the founding of the LDS church. While they had their faults and mistakes, I was raised in a loving home with a very dedicated mother and father. They were wonderful examples to me of faith and endurance in trying circumstances and they tried every day to center their family’s life on the principles of the LDS Gospel.

I was born with a membrane disease in my lungs that nearly took my life at birth. My parents, extended family and several members of their local LDS congregation fasted and prayed many times on my behalf. My parents had already endured the devastation of losing their first-born son two days after his birth and they begged God not to take me. By virtue of the fact that I am writing this, I am there miracle baby. I was spared.

I went through all of the LDS Church rights of passage: Baptism at 8, priesthood at 12, president of my priesthood quorums, Seminary graduate/scripture mastery, mission at 19, marriage at 23 and two beautiful daughters by the age of 28. By all accounts I was on the highway to heaven. I was the good son with the ideal family, budding successful career, faithful service in church callings, and extensive understanding of the LDS gospel.

SHOCK

In January of 1995 I prepare to go through the temple for the first time in preparation for my mission. I have been taught through the years that I would learn all that was necessary to gain my salvation by going through the temple. I believe it to be the pinnacle of true worship. I have expectations of learning great things through the covenants and true order of prayer as these parts of the temple have been quietly intimated to me through the years by my parents and teachers.

My parents, grandparents, various uncles and aunts and myself meet at the Idaho Falls Idaho temple on a bright clear Saturday morning. I am a little nervous about the unknown but tremendously excited that I have reached this point in my life. I have one older sister who had made some serious mistakes and fallen away from the faith during her teen years. I am the first of my parents children to ‘make it’ to the temple and it is the healing balm for their souls to see their oldest son ‘staying the course’.

…Let me take you now through my first experience in the temple…

I get my temple clothing packet from the rental counter. The first two whispering questions surface to my conscious mind…

~What is this clothing for?

~Why are there moneychangers in the temple?

‘No matter’ I rationalize, I am hear to receive enlightenment and make covenants in the House of the Lord. I go with my father to a small room that serves as some kind of office. There, the temple president explains to me the sacred nature of the Garment and the need to wear it from this point on as a shield and a protection. I go through the Washing and Anointing and New Name ceremony without much concern. I accept these ordinances based on references in the bible regarding the washing and anointing of priests and the periodic assignment of new names to various biblical patriarchs in the Old Testament.


I proceeded to the waiting chapel to sit and meditate until the time of the next session. The time has arrived and the company of people assembled in the chapel is ushered into the creation room (the Idaho Falls Temple still has separate creation, garden, telestial and terrestrial rooms with the video and audio segments appropriate for those parts of the ceremony queued up in succession). I sit and wait.

~The company is seated…

~The lights grow dim…

~I sit silently in the darkness...

~This is the beginning of the end…

“You will be required to take upon yourselves sacred obligations, the violation of which will bring upon you the judgment of God. For God will not be mocked…”

~I feel fear in the darkness…

“If any of you wish to withdraw rather than receive these covenants of your own free will and choice, you may now make it know by raising your hand…”

~I look around in the darkness…

~I see my family silhouetted in the darkness…

~I feel fear in the darkness…

~I remain seated in the darkness…

I witness the creation and go into the garden room. The fruit is eaten. The fall has commenced…

“Take some fig leaves and make you aprons. Father will see your nakedness. Quick! Hide!”

“Brothers and Sisters put on your aprons.”

~I obey Satan…

I make my first covenant to obey God’s law and keep his commandments. I see the sisters bow their heads in submission to their husband’s. I am now ready to receive the first token of the Aaronic Priesthood with its accompanying name and sign.

~What is a token?

~What will I do with it?

I receive the first token: A secret handshake.

~A secret handshake…

I make the sign. I make the covenant. “I, Jesse, solemnly covenant before God, Angels, and these witnesses at this altar, that I will never reveal the first token of the Aaronic Priesthood with it’s accompanying name and sign”

~A secret combination…

All my life I have been taught from the Book of Mormon that secret signs, oaths and societies are from the devil. They are responsible for the destruction of civilizations and untold misery.

~I have joined a secret society…

~I am now a part of a secret combination…

~I feel fear…

Adam and Eve are cast out of the garden. I go into the telestial room.

~Satan is looking at me…

“I have a word to say concerning these people. If they do not walk up to every covenant that they make at these altars in this temple today, the will be in my power…”

~I feel terror…

Satan is cast out. I receive more tokens and signs. I put on strange clothing.

~I look at my father…

~His face a mask of concentration, staring resolutely ahead…

~I look at my mother…

~Her face devoid of emotion, following by rote…

I look around at all the other patrons following en masse. All dressed in strange ceremonial clothing. All bow their heads and say yes.

~I am in a cult…

~My mind whispers quietly: Please God no…

“Each of you bow your head and say yes.”

The company chants in unison: “YES”

~I am trapped…

~My mind screams: PLEASE DEAR GOD NO!

“EACH OF YOU BOW YOUR HEAD AND SAY YES.”

~I bow my head…

~I say “yes”…

“Raise both hands high above the head and while lowering the hands, repeating three times the words: O God, hear the words of my mouth”

~Everyone raises their hands…

~I raise my hands…

~Everyone repeats the chant…

~I repeat the chant…

The sound of many voices as one has a numbing effect…

~I am no longer an individual…

The True order of prayer is introduced. I feel relief. Finally a prayer to sooth my tortured mind. We gather in a circle around the altar. This sisters veil their faces. We do not pray. We make the signs of all the tokens of the priesthood. We each take the hand of the sister to our left in the patriarchal grip, raise our left arms to the square, and rest them on the shoulder of the person to our left.

~The officiator kneels…

~He begins to pray…

“Those in the circle will repeat the words of the prayer”

~We repeat the words of the officiator…

~Our words are a monotone chant…

~I am in a séance…

The sound of many voices as one has a numbing effect…

~I am no longer an individual…

~I feel my mind growing numb…

~I obey…

~I accept…

I pass through the veil after receiving the name of the second token of the Melchizedek Priesthood and go into the celestial room. Family congratulating me in hushed and reverent tones surrounds me. I sit for a moment to ponder.

~I am in a cult…

~Dear God what have I done?

~I am in shock…

~I have learned nothing…

I visit the temple repeatedly to gain more insight. None comes. I just accept it all as I have been taught to do and eventually the questions and doubts are silenced as the euphoria of accomplishment enshrouds me.

~I made it…

~I am one of the elite…

~This is the beginning of the end…


UNANSWERED QUESTIONS

After my first time through the temple, I learn from my mother that the ordinances have been changed recently. I simply nodd in acknowledgement of here statement, still too shocked to really respond to this revelation. Looking back, it was the perfect time to broach the subject, as I would not give it another thought for 10 years.

While on my mission I become aware of the existence of the Masonic order. I learn that Joseph Smith was a Mason. I learn of the similarities between the Masonic and Temple ceremonies. I learned that the temple endowment ceremony was introduced within two months of Joseph Smith’s induction into the Masonic Order. I learned that Joseph restored the endowment to its full purity from its ancient and corrupted Masonic origins. I am too indoctrinated as a missionary to even entertain a concern about the whole situation. I accept it all.

In my second year of college in 1999 a fellow student, upon learning that I was a Mormon confides in me that he used to be a Mormon but that he left because of the Book of Abraham. As I listen, he explaines to me that is was nothing more than a common Egyptian funerary text and that Joseph Smith’s translation was completely false. He tells me how everybody told him to ‘read this or read that’ writing written by various apologists to explain away the problem but none of it made any sense. He summarizes by saying that maybe he doesn’t have enough faith. He cannot reconcile the glaring inconsistency. My faith was unwavering. I feel pity for him.

By the end of 2004 I am a traditional believing married Mormon Father of two with a home in the northern Utah suburbs and a college degree completed. I am in the elder’s quorum presidency, working in my field of interest and life is good. Over the last few years, I have encountered and ‘resolved’ to my satisfaction a multitude of evidences and questions that would shed doubt upon the divinity and authenticity of the church. I am a stalwart member. In October of 2004 I get a job offer within my company for a position at the corporate headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. My wife and I prayerfully consider and accept the offer. This is the first big move for us. My wife’s father works at the Bountiful Utah temple and he and his wife are preparing to serve a mission. We sell our home during the Christmas season and move to a small suburb north of Atlanta in January 2005. We are now on our own.

Shortly after our move to Georgia, my wife relates to me a phone conversation she had with her parents (they call usually once a week) in which her father mentioned in passing that the Initiatory ordinance had been changed. The comment passes and the conversation continues. All is well.

~All is not well…

~Deep inside my mind, a thought emerges…


COLLAPSE

~It keeps gnawing at me…

~I can’t seem to shake it…

~I’ll get over it…

I take the time one day to peruse the junk mail and run across an Oprah mail order book club list. I am browsing through the titles when I come across the title: Leaving the Saints: How I Lost the Mormons and Found My Faith by Martha Beck. I am intrigued and I read the brief description. I am always interested in why people leave the church if only to reinforce the various arguments I have constructed to bolster my faith. I do a search online at work and find that this is the daughter of Hugh Nibley, the most renowned church apologist. I read a few excerpts online…

~There is a crack in the foundation of my fortress of faith…

~The Book of Abraham is back…

~For reasons I know not, I cannot ignore it this time…

I begin to read. I read stories online about why people leave the LDS church. I read for two months. I collect their stories. I laugh with them, cry with them, I sympathize with them.

I am now in violation of question number six in the temple recommend interview: “Do you affiliate with any group or individual whose teachings or practices are contrary to or oppose those accepted by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or do you sympathize with the precepts of any such group or individual?”

~I bow my head and say yes…


HOPE

~I begin to think…

~I begin to question…

~I begin to doubt…

~I begin to learn…

~I begin to awaken…

I spend every available break time at work reading on the Internet. I revisit all of my concerns with an objective point of view. The evidence is devastating. It has been here all along and I have refused to see it in the light of rational thought. I have forcefully refused to use the brain that God gave me for over 10 years. I drink from the fountains of knowledge like a man dying of thirst. I have never felt so liberated. I ask God if what I am doing is right. I feel an incredible sense of peace and love envelope me and I know in my heart and mind that what I am doing is right.

~I am an individual!

~I am alive!

~I am free!

I am… married to a devout Mormon woman and I have two daughters. I am… in the elder’s quorum presidency. I am… in a large Mormon family that, with only 2 exceptions, is all devout believers. I start to think again. We are on our own now. Family is thousands of miles away. I begin to hope. If I make the information passively available, my wife will listen to the voice of reason. I share my concern of the changing temple ordinances with her. She is shocked but tries to understand and agrees that I need to prayerfully study my concerns to get the answers that I am seeking. I bring ‘By His Own Hand Upon Papyrus’ by Charles Larson home to casually read.

I am reading more and more each day. Finding a special thrill in entertaining serious questions and using my reason and intellect along with inspiration to find the truth. I am learning to love absolute truth without loyalty to any organization. It has truly set me free. I can question anything! I can reach my own carefully thought out conclusions! No information is off limits! I can truly exercise my mind! It is incredibly intoxicating.

~I know the truth now…

~The Mormon Church is a man made institution…

~It has no claim to exclusive authority…

~I know…

~I am so happy…

By this time I have stopped paying tithing. I am getting a better handle on the family finances as a result. I am cultivating a more tolerant and loving worldview. I am less judgmental. I no longer view life through the confining prism of Mormonism.

~The freedom is intoxicating…

~I don’t tell my wife…

~This is my fatal mistake…

Thursday, July 28th, 2005: we come to an emotional confrontation that lasts until four o’clock in the morning. Because I now hold the church in suspect, my wife tells me that our marriage is based on a lie. She tells me that she wishes that our children had never been born. She tells me that she does not want her daughters raised in a home with an unbeliever.

~I read the writing on the wall…


TRAPPED

Friday, July 29th, 2005: I come home from work and my wife tells me she has come to some conclusions. We sit and talk. She has read ‘By His Own Hand Upon Papyrus’. She tells me that the truth is anti Mormon. She has thrown away the book. She tells me that Satan is tempting me with the facts. She tells me her testimony is unshakable. She tells me that in order for her to support me in my journey, I must do things her way. I must study only the scriptures and approved church scripture study guides alone and with her. She tells me I must put aside the facts and the truth for now. If at the end I still feel that the church is not true, she does not know what she will do. She may go into therapy. She may leave me. She may take my children away. She has called her parents and my parents while I am at work. They have all agreed to open their homes to her immediately if necessary. She tells me that my parents are prepared to come to my home this weekend and if necessary, she will go back with them. She has set an appointment with the bishop for Sunday morning.

~I am trapped…


DECISION

Saturday, July 30, 2005 – midnight: I cannot sleep. I go to the downstairs living room. I lay on the couch. I talk with God. I know the truth now. I love my family more than life itself. I would rather die than lose my children.

~Truth is irrelevant…

~Truth must be ignored once again…

~Facts must be buried once again…

~Freedom must be surrendered once again…

~I put on the blindfold…

~I put on the shackles…

~I am a voluntary prisoner in my own mind…

~I commit intellectual suicide tonight…

~I commit spiritual suicide tonight…

~I do this willingly, fully aware of the consequences, for the rest of my life…

~Freedom and reason are buried under the crushing weight of the foundation of my prison…

~I cry tonight…

~My soul dies tonight…

I go to the bishop Sunday morning. I say what is necessary. I will conform. I talk to my parents that night. I will conform. Because I love my family more than life itself I will conform. This is the legacy of Mormonism: conformity. I voluntarily submit myself to the horrifically comforting mental conditioning once again. I close forever the covers of enlightening literature. I will read and understand only what is approved.

~It is so easy…

~It is so simple…

~Yes…

~I understand…

~I bow my head and say yes…


~But…


~Buried in the recesses of my conscience, there will always be a bright spark of pure truth…

~Lingering…

~I know…


REMEMBER US…

To those of you on the outside reading this, I beg you, please do not forget us. Please remember the hundreds of thousands of unique, special, beautiful individuals that are currently serving life sentences in the prison of Mormonism. Please do not cease to pray; to whatever God you serve, for our deliverance. Some of us have no hope for redemption or liberation. For the greater good, we willingly sacrifice our souls upon the altar of conformity and orthodoxy. Our pain is real. Our sentence is absolute.

I will always hold out hope that one day, perhaps within my lifetime though not likely, that pure truth will prevail. I hope someday that the desire to understand the truth at all costs will override the desire to maintain tradition and conformity. Until that day I will try to find some grain of happiness somewhere, anywhere, in the spiritual abyss that I have willingly entered into.

~I bid farewell to progress…

~I bid farewell to truth…

~I bid farewell to reason…

~I bid farewell to freedom…

To those of you on the outside, I thank you. I thank you for your courage. I thank you for your wisdom and insight. I thank you for your compassion and understanding. I thank you for your stories. I thank you for showing me the truth and allowing me to bask in its warmth, even if for a small moment. I love you all. I hope that truth will ultimately prevail. I hope that you and I will live to see it.

Until that time, I go, quietly, shackled and blinded once more into the prison that awaits me. I bid you all farewell.

Remember me…

Remember us…

~I feel myself submerge once again into the group…

~I feel the darkness close around my mind…

~Strange…

~It feels so comfortable…

~So familiar…

~It doesn’t hurt very much anymore…

~I feel my identity slipping quietly away…

~I am no longer and individual…

~I bow my head and say yes…

Someone wrote:

"Does anyone have any ideas on how to get a wife who is very Molly Mormon to see the truth? I've known since I went to the temple for my "mission" that it was all baloney and VERY cult-ish. And I can honestly say that "the spirit" told me that the chuch was NOT true a whole lot stronger than it ever told me it was true. It feels SO WONDERFUL to say and believe that the church is a bunch of baloney. But how do I convince my wife? This is not something that I can just walk away from and have her support. She will freak out. She is VERY "molly", I'm talking RS President, reads 'scriptures' and texts daily, I'm talking "fanatic" here. Any help will be GREATLY appreciated.

Thanks."

Someone answered:

"I used to be exactly who your wife is. I was not only RS President, but STAKE RS, as well--gung ho in every principle and belief they spoon fed me. There was NO WAY I would ever leave my wonderful, true church...but my husband, a returned missionary with a Stake President father DID leave. It was subtle at first. He would "not feel good" and not attend his meetings...He would turn down callings saying his job kept him too busy, but I knew something was wrong. You don't DO that in the church!

When I finally confronted him about it, I thought I was going to die when he told me he no longer believed. I needed his testimony to sustain my own! He said he would never stop me or our children from going, but he just could not be unfaithful to himself any longer. You know as well as I do that does not work in the LDS church. It is first and foremost a family church run by the MAN of the house. He had doomed our home to living on the fringes, a second-class entity (if that) in the eyes of the church.

For a week or two I went into a tailspin. I prayed. I cried. I lamented my choice in a mate that I had so carefully cultivated years before (but I LOVED the man!) There did not seem to be an answer for me, (God certainly didn't give me one) and it all seemed SO unfair when I had been so careful in selecting my life's partner! How could he break up our eternal family? How could he throw the truth and me away so easily? Of course it wasn't easy, but it seemed like it to me. He actually had struggled with it for YEARS--alone, in silence...

We resolved it for a short time (after a crying jag he could no longer stomach) by him telling me, "If you believe it so much, please find a way to convert me back. Read the literature. Read everything you can find that I have read that convinces me the church is not true, and then disprove it to me. I WANT to believe. I just can't."

That is EXACTLY what I did. I read EVERY piece of literature I could get my hands on, vowing I would find the fallacy in each and lead him back to the fold, and at the same time strengthen my own weak beliefs. The result of this study is obvious, as I am posting on this site. I, too, finally discovered what he had found (it was a long, hard, agonizing journey)...that the church just could not possibly be true.

Before this I ONLY read church-sanctioned books--the standard works, the approved study manuals. I "avoided the very appearance of evil" in my study, mainly because I didn't WANT to have doubts. They were creeping in, but I saw that as my own weakness. However, when I began my quest, I was sure if I read the "anti" literature with a pure heart, God would show me the fallacies contained therein and help me on my mission to reinstill my husband's testimony and strengthen my own.

And, of course, as the study contined, I WAS shown the fallacies...the falacies were contained in what I had devoured all my life--empty calories from which I fed my soul for so long it was malnourished to the point of starvation. And my NEW study began to revive it! I was too weak and dilusional to see that what I fed myself was killing the REAL me. My spiritual being, my essence, my soul was dying or dead, and I didn't even realize it.

I know not all stories will end like ours did (and we will always struggle with our TBM families). There are broken marriages and broken hearts over this issue, but I have to give my dh credit for never pushing, never arguing with me about my beliefs. He just encouraged me to "win him back" in the fight. He took the high road and turned me to the truth without criticism of the church or of what I felt. It was a brilliant move. And it worked wonders for our marriage and for our lives (once I realized he was right, of course). But it didn't come easy and it didn't happen over night. He was patient (much more so that I was.)

At first I got angry at what I read, and that was always a struggle. But soon, I started to read and REALLY study. I went to the temple (alone) and really listened and watched (and got sick to my stomach all over again). I'd only been once before, when I got married, and even though I had "feelings of doubt" on my first visit, I dismissed them as stress of the day and went on believing as much as I could.

I got my answer. I had never had a TRUE testimony. I never got a witness, but I relied on the testimonies of others to keep me going. I just thought I wasn't good enough, wasn't valiant enough, wasn't strong enough...and I kept trying to live for when I'd get the still small voice telling me God had finally accepted me and given me a witness. I wonder how many others IN the church are just like I was...waiting and hoping to be loved and good enough to receive God's revelations of truth, and never REALLY getting it? I have to believe it is MOST of them--no wonder they are all so sad! They fight so hard against outside study because the ARE weak in their beliefs. They can't have had confirmation, because there is none to have. Whatever they go on, it isn't God's whisperings. Maybe it is dillusions and light-headedness from fasting to get an answer.

I wish you luck. It is not an easy road for either of you. But it IS worth the struggle in the long run."

J Renee

Charlene's Story

I grew up in Seneca County (birthplace of the Church) in upstate New York. When I was four years old, my parents converted from Judaism to Mormonism. Though I was on the surface a typical good Mormon girl (Mia Maid president, Laurel president, etc.) I had many questions about the Church. I was in junior high school when I was first exposed to the truth about Joseph Smith and his many (and young) wives. As I encountered more and more problematic things with the Church I tried to reassure myself that for now I just needed to rely on faith and then God would tell me everything when I reached the Celestial Kingdom.

Like a good girl, I went to BYU. This was the biggest eye-opener of my life. I was exposed to doctrine that shocked me, and very often this doctrine was being preached from one of our religion courses. Some examples of the trash I had to hear: Mother Teresa is not going to the Celestial Kingdom because she hasn't married, and no woman can get into heaven without a husband; The reason blacks got the priesthood in the '70s was because in the preexistence whites were more valiant than non-whites, but God ran out of white "molds" and had to put righteous spirits in black bodies; German Mormons who supported Hitler were righteous, because they were following the Articles of Faith--supporting the laws of their land; God had sex with Mary to produce Jesus (and in heaven all the men get multiple wives--the more the merrier); God gave men the priesthood and women the ability to give birth (the same way he did to female rats, cats, skunks, etc.). I could go on and on for hours about the horrible things I heard.

Then there was the atmosphere at BYU itself. I was very ill physically and had to undergo several surgeries. Needless to say, I couldn't always attend Church. I received many notices that this lack of attendance was jeopardizing my ability to remain a BYU student. When I explained my health problems, I was told that if I had enough faith, I could go to Church anyway.>

I was full of a great deal of confusion after my freshman year, but I returned for my sophomore year determined that I could keep my faith until I solved all these hypocrisies in the Church.

By then (1995) BYU was becoming more and more of a police state. I had decided to become a physician after my health problems and I was taking some third year level microbiology courses. The first day of school, I walked in and sat down in the lecture hall. All of a sudden, I felt eyes on me. I looked around and realized I was the only woman in the class. Then, the professor walked in. He glared at me and loudly demanded to know what I was doing there. I told him I was there for Microbiology 3--. He demanded to know if I had taken the prerequisite courses. I assured him I had. He then asked if I knew that the class was supposed to be for pre-med students. I said yes, and I was pre-med. He gave me a glare and told the class "Well, I guess she can be here, then". The guys began laughing and saying that I was just there to catch a husband who was going to be a doctor, and therefore rich. I was able to hold back my tears until I got home. Things went from bad to worse. I was actually threatened by students in my Chemistry lab when they found out I had the second highest grade. They said that it was wrong for a girl to screw up their curve. A guy I had been dating occasionally gave me a note saying he could no longer date me after he found out I had gotten a higher grade on a chem test than he had--it was against God's plan.

Then, BYU began to crack down even more. They announced that beginning in April '96 people would have to sign a form indicating that they would turn people in who were violating the so-called Honor Code. Some of my family escaped (and some were not so lucky) from Hitler during the War, so I was no stranger to the effects of Nazi-Gestapo tactics. I knew that I would never sign such a thing. I began applying to other schools to transfer as soon as possible. Meanwhile, a person I knew had her first taste of the Gestapo atmosphere: She was a typical naive Utah Mormon, all excited because a GUY had come up to her on campus. He said "Hi" and asked her where she was going. She told him and he said he'd walk her to class. On the way he asked her what her name was, where she was from, where she lived, her major, and her phone number. When they reached her class he stopped and said "I just wanted to let you know--I'm a member of the Honor Code committee and you've given me all the information I need to turn you in--your skirt is too short."

By now, I was having serious problems with the Church. After a great deal of scripture reading and heartfelt prayer, I went to my Bishop. I explained my problems with the way things were. He asked if I'd prayed and I told him I had. Then he asked if I'd prayed so that if God said that everything I had questioned (racism, sexism, etc.) was as I had been taught at BYU that I'd stop being disobedient (i.e., pre-med). I said that if God was that nasty and cruel, then I would say to God, "No thank you, I think I'll live in Hell." [Big mistake, Mormons can't stand that word.] The bishop said that was where I was headed and told me to leave and never come back. I listened to him. :)

More than a decade after leaving the Church unofficially (and more than 5 years after officially resigning from it) I continue to deal with problems related to my feelings of guilt and betrayal. Also, my family was abusive and even though I had serious problems growing up I am devastated by the rifts that the Church has caused in my family. One of my brothers and one of my sisters converted to other religions (fundamentalist Christian and Catholic respectively) . My father has no contact with them anymore and many of my other siblings won't speak to my brother. I could use support as I try to put the Church behind me.

I look forward to participating in this group.
-Charlene

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