MY RANT FOR THE DAY

I posted something on the discussion board on PostMormon.org today that I still feel like ranting about. 

This was my post:

It's NOT as though there are only two or three things... or even three or four... there is a mountain of evidence against TSCC being "the one and only true church."  If there was just a couple areas of concern, perhaps it could be accepted as "true," but when there so many fraudulent areas, it stands to reason that it's actually false.  It is simply not possible to put aside the fact that there are differing versions of the First Vision; that polygamy was obviously put into play by Joseph Smith to cover-up his philandering; that the Prophet of the Restoration committed adultery with teenager girls and married women; that he was actually a criminal and not a religious martyr; that he created and/or plagiarized the BoM and the BoA; that he paved the way for 150 years of blatant racism to exist in the Mormon Church; that he bent everything to his goal of being "all-powerful" in everyone's eyes so they would do whatever he said they should; and so much more.
 
I was thinking about this earlier, and I couldn't help but ask myself how anyone who knows the truth behind so many of the doctrines and so much of the history of TSCC can remain associated with it.  It just doesn't make sense.  Accepting everything blindly and by faith is somewhat possible when you don't actually think about things, but it requires so much rationalization, so much overlooking evidence, so much burying your head in the sand that it boggles my mind how anyone can not think that it is simply a fraud and a scam.
 
It reminds me of being married to my second husband.  If I could have overlooked the fact that he was abusive to me, I still had to deal with the fact that he was mean and abusive to my daughter, and saw how that was affecting her.  For a while, I overlooked both of those facts and tried to focus on the positive aspects.  But as time went on, I realized that whatever "positive" aspects there were, the negative ones were so overwhelming that they over-shadowed whatever benefits I may have derived from being married to that man.  Once I realized that, remaining in a situation that was clearly destroying both of us was a no-brainer for me.  In the same respect, it became a no-brainer for me to finally realize that TSCC is not what it professes to be, and to see what being a member of that church was doing to me as an individual and as a woman. 
 
In essence, every member of TSCC is in an abusive relationship with their church.  They take what TSCC dishes out, and they bury their heads in the sand, in essence pretending that TSCC truly is "the one and only true church on the face of the earth," and that they are deriving good benefits from their membership.  But in reality, TSCC is killing each and every one of them... it is killing their spirits, their individuality, and their zest for life.

Ok, rant over for now...

I got a few really interesting responses:

OldSoul posted this response:

The deconversion process for any religion follows a similar pattern.  Belief isn't rooted in a single doctrine or idea.  It's more of host of ideas connected by a supportive web.  Counter any one idea or belief and the entire belief structure still survives.  Most people encounter one or two things that will challenge their beliefs. It takes a person willing to examine many points of belief to have a chance of deconverting.  One by one you must put these ideas to the test.  Are they real?  logical?  is there evidence?  Not many people are able to do this.   
 
I'd think most people having gone through a full deconversion would feel like there were 100s of problems with their previous belief system.  You feel this way because you've put your belief structure to the test and point by point it failed.  I can't think of many religions that would really stand up to this kind of analysis.  It's pretty much all a bunch of hooey.

And LDS Truthseeker posted this response:

Yeah, if it was just a matter of having no evidence to support the Church's claims, then that would be one thing.  We would just need a certain amount of faith to accept the Church's claims.  However it is not the lack of evidence but rather the contradictory evidence that makes the claims of the Church so hard to believe.
 
If it was just a couple irreconcilable items that needed an extra measure of faith, then that would be a hurdle most of us would be willing to shelve until the next life.  But the sheer accumulation of significant issues that contradict what we've been taught makes it seem inconceivable that all of these things somehow have some sort of extraordinary explanation.
 
Maybe none of the individual items is in itself an absolute deal-breaker.  But the sheer volume of significant issues makes it inconceivable that the Church is really what it claims to be.
 
Maybe there really are fantastic explanations to explain all these things like God changed the American Indian's DNA from Jewish to Asian, Egyptologists don't really understand Egyptian, archaeologists just haven't found the steel swords, horses, and elephants mentioned in the BOM, Joseph didn't really know where the Hill Cumorah from the BOM was, the scribes were responsible for all the errors and misquotings of the prophets, blacks really are cursed from God through Cain, Joseph's brothers sleeping in Joseph's own bed with him just slept while Moroni visited him all night, evil men really did steal the lost 116 pages but just decided to destroy this valuable document, the Masons really did have the original temple ceremony from Solomon's time, God brought all the dinosaur bones from other planets to the Earth, etc.
 
If these and many, many more fantastic explanations for all the numerous problems were really true, then that would be even more amazing and unbelievable than the story of the restoration itself as taught by the Church!  What are the chances that ALL of the damning evidence against the Church will suddenly reverse itself?
 
I think that anyone that knows the complete, true, historic details of all of these events, and many others not listed here, and is then asked to still believe in them as taught by the Church, is asking for more sheer faith than anyone should be asked to have.

And then howdidimissthat posted this response:

I could have excused a handful of historic omissions but when EVERY "fact" I thought I knew ended up being a lie everything changed, I had no more respect for their dishonest system.  Some "facts" were omitted from history, others were distorted and rewritten.  The intent was dishonest when it happened and it is dishonest to continue lying.  The leaders will never step up and do the right thing.  They will never tell the truth as the truth not as an excuse or an apologetic explanation.  The big 15 have too much to lose if they present the true facts and apologize for years of lying, they don't give a rat's ass about the members.  They are cowards. 

Very interesting discussion.  My rant for the day culminated in me writing a poem... which I posted in the Poetry section of this blog...

EX-MORMON FOUNDATION CONFERENCE, 2010

Last month, I went to an Ex-Mormon Foundation Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah for the very first time.  Since then, I've been reflecting on what I gained from that experience.  Part of my reason for wanting to attend the conference was to meet many of the people with whom I have been sharing exchanges on the PostMormon discussion board (http://www.postmormon.org/).  People who have shared similar experiences with me in disassociating themselves from the Mormon Church.  People who can relate to my struggles.  People with whom I have common ground.  And meeting these people was definitely worth the trip.  Going on the discussion board on PostMormon.org has been very enlightening and reassuring since so many of these people, like me, have discovered the falsities and contradictions in Mormonism -- and doing so, they have struggled to free themselves from the Mormon mindset, which is no easy task.  So meeting these people in person completed the circle to form actual friendships.

The conference began with an "open mic" session (ala Fast and Testimony meetings) where people got up to introduce themselves and say whatever they wanted to share.  This was the first time I began to put "aliases" with actual names and faces, and I had several "aha" moments during that two-hour session.  I have always found it very interesting to place faces with voices of people to whom I have talked on the phone over the years, especially at work -- and they rarely turn out to look the way I have envisioned them.  And of course, this was a similar type of experience in that regard.  There were many people who got up and gave very touching "testimonies."  One woman in partricular almost had me in tears because I could relate so much with what she said about feeling trapped in the Mormon Church for so long and finally being able to break free.  And the ones that were fairly young and had managed to break free made me feel very envious since I remained "trapped" until I was 52 years old.

Another very touching part of the conference was seeing a documentary entitled, "In the Shadow of the Temple."  This film is about people who, although they have discovered many unsolvable problems with the Mormon Church and thus have become non-believers, have remained active in it because of family pressures.  As stated in a review on Amazon.com:

"Those who consider leaving Mormonism face the consequences of isolation from their communities, shattered marriages and devastated family relationships. In the Shadow of the Temple is a 55 minute documentary that weaves together the stories of still-practicing non-believers and ex-Mormons as they reject the culture and teachings of the Church. Their strategies of coping can be as varied as hiding their disbelief and continuing to practice, to defiant refutation of the Church and its teachings." 

I was very touched by this film, and was in tears by the end.  I was very gratified to be told at the end of the film by one of the producers who was there, though, that all of those who appeared in "shadow" in the film had all "come out" by the end of the filming.

Another wonderful part of the conference was the dinner on Saturday night at which Tal Bachman spoke.  He is a musician and former Mormon who left the Mormon Church several years ago after discovering many things about the doctrine that he could not reconcile.  His story was very compelling, and I was very interested in how it began.  He talked about how he had been called to be the Gospel Doctrine teacher in Sunday School, and the research that he began to do about Genesis and the Book of Abraham.  When he began to see many conflicting ideas in the two, he began to do more research and discovered many things that he did not previously know.  This led him to do more research, and of course, this led him to discover more and more inaccuracies, inconsistencies and contradictions in the Standard Works of the LDS Church.  Ultimately, he came to the conclusion that Joseph Smith had made up the whole thing, and that Mormon doctrine is filled with lies and deception.

Continuing with his story, Tal said that after coming to this conclusion, he could not rationalize out teaching the Gospel Doctrine class anymore, so he went to his Bishop to ask to be released.  After discussing what he had discovered with the Bishop, and the Bishop providing no good answers, the Bishop suggested that he speak with the Stake President about his concerns.  So Tal made an appointment to meet with his Stake President, and was dumbfounded by the Stake President's reaction.  According to Tal, the Stake President told him that he knew that Joseph Smith had lied about many things, but that he (the Stake President) chose to stay in the church anyway because it made him a better husband and father.  When Tal said that, I was stunned.  Of course, Tal wasn't able to see the rationale behind the Stake President's thinking and was very confused by what he had encountered with both his Bishop and the Stake President.  Apparently after that, Tal talked to his wife (and mother of his 8 children) about what he had discovered, what he had been told by both the Bishop and the Stake President, and she was as puzzled by the whole thing as Tal was.  He described how sick they both felt at that point, not knowing what to do next.

Tal concluded his remarks by saying that the icing on the cake was a couple of weeks later when the Primary children were giving the Sacrament Meeting program, saying that they knew the church was true, that Joseph Smith is a Prophet of God, and all the things that Mormon children are taught to believe -- and there was the Stake President sitting there in Sacrament Meeting, smiling broadly as he listened to all of that.  Tal said that he and his wife sat there, looking at each other in puzzlement, and that they didn't go to church after that.  Unfortunately, though, the process of extricating themselves from the Mormon Church also eventually tore Tal and his wife apart, and they are now divorced.

All in all, my experience at the Ex-Mormon Foundation conference in SLC was a very good one, and I am very glad that I went.  I hope to be able to go next year as well -- and would like to make it an annual event.  After describing my experiences to my daughter, she told me that she would like to go next year with me, and I would love to share the experience with her.

One very big treat was driving from Denver, Colorado to SLC - not on my way there (because I drove through lower Wyoming, which was very tan and bland), but on the way back.  On my return trip from Utah to Colorado, I drove through southeast Utah and then into Colorado on I-70, which was an absolutely beautiful drive.  Being Fall, the leaves on the trees were changing colors, and the backdrop of scenic beauty was breathtaking, particularly through the area surrounding Aspen, Colorado.  Driving along with the mountains surrounding me and the Colorado River running alongside the highway with the Fall colors splashed through the scenery was almost surreal.

THINKING, EXAMINING, AND ANALYZING

These are all very important functions of the human brain.  Being born and raised in the Mormon Church, I grew up not realizing the importance of thinking, examining, and analyzing.  Being told, in essence, that I should not examine or analyze beliefs of the Mormon Church is not only wrong on many levels, but it is also very debilitating.  People must be able to think critically, examine closely, and analyze fully whatever they feel is necessary to confirm realities in their lives. 

Curiosity is a natural state which, in my opinion, should be encouraged.  A person's natural curiosity in conjunction with imagination and intelligence is what makes life vital and interesting - and feeling trapped in a world where your natural curiosity is squelched and stifled, where your innate intelligence is not applauded, and where your ability to think critically and analyze situations is not only discouraged but also practically prohibited, is tantamount to holding a person's brain in prison. 

So it is with religion, and in particular, Mormonism.  Faith is all fine and good - but when the facts contradict those things that "they" tell you are true and what you "should" believe, it's not called faith anymore, but rather denial.  I spent so many years in the chains of denial that I felt like I was living in a tunnel with no light anywhere to be seen.  But when I finally began to examine and analyze my "beliefs," I discovered that what I had believed in for so many years was actually false - and not only did light finally appear at the end of the tunnel, but the house of cards constructed so carefully by Mormonism came tumbling down in my mind.

And now I am breathing free - able to think, examine and analyze - and then to accept or reject what I discover on my own terms.  Living an authentic life truly is its own reward.

DEDICATION TO MY MOTHER

Looking back on my life, I realize that the person who has most influenced me is my mother.  Sadly, she passed away in 1977 when she was only 64 years old (and I was 25).  Because of her untimely death, I have always felt robbed of an adult relationship with her, and I have always wondered how different my life might have been if she had lived longer and been around for me to "garner wisdom" from her.

But even though I consider her to be very influential in my life, she has always also always been somewhat of an enigma to me, especially now that I left the Mormon Church.  The woman who I knew as my mother was a very strong, independent woman who always seemed to have it all together.  I have always admired those traits in her, and I have always felt that I inherted many of those types of mindsets from her.  But the fact that she was also a devout Mormon is a very big puzzlement for me.

There are so many questions I would like to ask my mother, especially about the Mormon Church and her conversion at age 40, just a few months after I was born.  My father lived to be 92 years old, and he passed away in 2006.  About a year before his death, my father and I were talking and he told me that when he and my mother were investigating the Mormon Church, my mother had a hard time accepting that Joseph Smith as a Prophet of God, but that she finally was able to reconcile her feelings and decided to be baptized.  I wish I could ask her what settled that issue in her mind, although to a certain extent, it still remains questionable to me that she actually ever did.  Perhaps she joined the Mormon Church to please my father or because she thought it would be good for her children for her to have a unified religion with her husband (since he accepted it all from the "get-go").  I wish I knew her motivation for joining the Mormon Church. 

I do remember my mother telling me once (shortly after I was married for the first time) that my father and her had discussed divorce a few years after they were married.  Of course, I was surprised - but the more I thought about it, the more I could see how their differences could have easily driven them in that direction.  The backdrop for her telling me this was my telling her about a Fireside for young couples that my then-husband and I had attended, and a speech was given by the Stake President who said that couples should never even let the word "divorce" cross their lips - that the concept of divorce should never even enter your mind, despite whatever the problems might be.  The SP then said that he and his wife had been married for 40 years or more, and that in that entire time, they had never even discussed "divorce."  While telling my mother about this Fireside, my father entered the room and stopped to listen to what I was saying.  After I finished talking about this Fireside, my mother turned to my father said said, "Well, we can't say that, can we?"  I'll never forget the look on my father's face as he looked at my mother said said, "Why did you have to bring that up?"

Perhaps one day, I'll be able to have further conversations with my mother.  After all, I still believe in God and an Afterlife - to me, those are spiritual beliefs, and the Mormons don't have an exclusive claim on God-related doctrine or the belief in an afterlife.

More than anything, I would like to discuss my exit from the Mormon Church with my mother.  Naturally, I wonder what her reaction would be to what I have discovered that has negated my beliefs in its doctrines.  Perhaps I am being naive and engaging in wishful thinking, but in my heart, I think she would understand and would celebrate my growth and independent thinking.  At least, I hope so...