Mormons can leave the Church, but they just can't leave it alone: I believe families can be together forever

Saturday, March 16, 2013

I believe families can be together forever

I don't believe God will damn me for not believing in a book that has been proven to be a fraud, time and time again.

I don't believe I will be denied an eternal life with my family for not accepting an adulterer, liar, pedophile, and fraud to be a prophet of God.

God gave me 5 senses along with a brain capable of reason and logic. Why would God give me all this and expect me to ignore everything I am able to learn about Mormonism by using them? My 5 senses and my skills for reason and logic all emphatically and irrefutably indicate Mormonism is not what it claims to be. Why would God punish me for drawing conclusions that are consistent with the evidence I have before me?

The church teaches we should ignore all the evidence against the church and just listen to our hearts. Our hearts will feel warm and we are to interpret that to mean the church is true. This method is fraught with problems and is not in any way a reliable method for determining truth. If it were reliable, then there would not be millions of people arriving at contradicting conclusions based on the exact same feeling.

In short, I believe I will face God and he will say something like this.

"I'm proud of you, my son. You were born into a family that told you to believe in a lot of false things. You were told Joseph Smith spoke for me. You were conditioned to believe the Book of Mormon was a literal historical record, etc.

It's very difficult for the human brain to let go of beliefs that are developed from a young age and repeated over many decades. Even when presented with facts and evidence, the human brain clings to the beliefs that got there first. And with family pressure to conform being added to the mix, it makes it even more difficult to admit your beliefs just may be wrong.

But in the face of family and societal pressure, and a lifetime of constant teachings, you were able to find the truth. You explored the facts surrounding your cherished beliefs and you were able to recognize truth and set aside the beliefs that did not line up with reality.

You used my gifts to you, 5 senses and reason and logic, to overcome a lifetime of false teachings. It was not easy to overcome your brain's tendency to retain your false beliefs. And you certainly paid a high relational cost with respect to your family and friends. But you were willing to pay the highest price for the truth. You valued truth above all else and made any and all sacrifices necessary to seek it.

Well done, my good and faithful servant. Well done"

I look forward to meeting God and having that conversation.

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About This Blog

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints frequently leave the organization. And often these former, or disbelieving, members provide commentary on the church. More often than not, the commentary is less than complimentary.

A common response to this situation, from believing members is, "Well, you can leave the Church, but you can't leave it alone." In truth, I myself have made this exact statement many times in response to comments from former members.

In reality, the vast majority of former members would be more than willing, and very happy, to leave the Church completely behind. Nothing would give them greater happiness than to see the Church fading in the dust in their rear view mirror. But this is not to be the case for so many members who have discovered the Church to not be what they always thought it was.

The reasons for this are varied and complicated. Many former members still have family members such as parents or siblings who still believe and don't understand how someone they care about could "give up their eternal salvation" and leave the church. The family pressure is still there, no matter how much the former member wishes it would disappear.

Many former members still have a spouse or children who not only believe but want to attend. It makes for a very awkward and delicate situation when one spouse is packing up the kids and heading off to church while the other spouse stays home. The disbelieving spouse would be ecstatic if their spouse and children would join them and they could all leave the church behind. But this is not to be.

For far too many former members, very real and material damage was done to them by the Church and its members. The forms of this damage are many. Homosexuals are especially damaged by the Church. For impressionable youth who may "slip up" and not toe the line perfectly, an insensitive or uncaring church leader may not handle the situation well and give the youth the impression they are guilty of heinous sins. The guilt and shame associated with this can be carried into adulthood. When the member discovers the Church is not true, they may feel resentment for having been subjected to such guilt and shame when the basis for those feelings was imaginary and were unnecessarily heaped on them by a church leader. It can take a long time for these wounds to heal.

Many believing members feel that when former members make comments about the church and are intent on pointing out the flaws in the organization, they are doing so because secretly they believe the Church to be true and are only being negative about the Church to ease their guilty conscience. This is simply not the case. Former members are still affected by the church, even though most of them want nothing more than to be free of it, and so in response they feel compelled to stand up for themselves and not just lay over and continue to be victimized by the Church. They've been the victim long enough and are ready to be done.

Helpful websites for learning more about Mormonism

Saturday, March 16, 2013

I believe families can be together forever

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