Posted by:
Stunted
(
)
Date: June 07, 2012 12:30PM
I don't know if it was one of my posts you specifically called out but I fit the description you gave. My oldest son married this spring and I refused to fly across the country for the honor of being excluded from that wedding. I'll try to patiently explain why.
1. Not only was I not invited to the wedding, I was specifically labeled as “unworthy”.
I suspect you are still very much a TBM and as such you may not have the perspective to understand what a nasty insult that is. Let me tell you, it's a very nasty insult. I have been very involved in my children's lives. I've changed diapers, fed them clothed them, attended Parent Teacher Conferences, taught them to ride bikes at to drive cars. I cried with my son when he had his first big heart break in High School. I took him camping and fishing, I taught him to water ski and to snow board. I am his father in every sense of the word, but I'm “unworthy” to attend his wedding? Fuck you and the horse you rode in on.
2. I refuse to feed the Mormon Superiority Complex.
Like you, I've attended many PEC and Ward Council meetings. I've witnessed the gossiping and the backbiting that goes on. And don't try to tell me it must have been one rogue ward. I've attended those meetings in Utah, Texas, New Jersey and Alabama. They are all the same. Mormon Doctrine demands that members consider themselves the chosen ones, the only true disciples of Christ, God's favored. Every one else is a conversion target or lost. I didn't go to the wedding because I refused to stand there while the self righteous Mormons paraded past me looking down their noses and pitying me for having lost my may and not being good enough to even attend my son's wedding.
3. Someone has to stand up to the bully.
The church gets away with this kind of behavior because nobody calls them on it. I told my son why I wasn't going. He gets it. He thinks the church is wrong. I told my wife why I wasn't going. She didn't like it but understands and knows how much pain this stupid church policy has caused. I offered her a deal. I was willing to go if she would stand with me outside the temple holding hands as husband and wife. She refused. Family first? Now try to explain to me how the cult of Mormonism is all about families.
I don't attend church, I don't consider myself a member and I certainly don't support their programs or their bigoted positions regarding women and homosexuals. I may be at the fringes of Mormonism, but it isn't because of anything I do. The Mormon church is simply part of the landscape where I live. It's everywhere, work, home, school. Even at the local Walmart there is an entire shelf dedicated to Mormon books and kitsch items. I haven't even started with the extended family aspects of the Mormon fringe. I'm in it because I don't have choice in the matter. The Mormon fringe is like a skunk blast. It gets on everything and lingers forever.
As a good little Mormon you're probably thinking: “Well if you don't like Utah, why don't you move?” Am I right? See, there's that Mormon Superiority Complex again. Just try to put yourself in our shoes and walk a mile or two. You might be surprised at what you find.