People who are convinced their faith-based claims are 100% true will do all they can to try to get you to believe them.
This is true of every hoax or scam out there. In the LDS Church this is the testimony that is continually reinforced, even to the point of "doubt your doubts."

My experience regarding changing my mind from a faith-based testimony was one of obtaining factual information from reliable sources (from the LDS Church's own history) and making my own conclusion. No faith crisis. No doubts. Just good evidence from their sources. When we are loaded up with facts, verifiable evidence, we can be assured we are on solid ground.
We don't need to rely on faith or other spiritual techniques to verify the claims. We have the records from the original history.

As human beings, we make the best choice and decision we can with the information we have at the time. When we find new and better information we can adjust our thinking, change our mind. I did! I changed my mind about the claims of the LDS Church regarding. Every single one.
And I did it with a sense of humor. No need to take it all so seriously. (There are some exceptions that are very serious of course.) I giggled and laughed a lot. No way. People are still believing these claims by ..what?? Faith? Prayer? No way!! There were no golden plates, no angels, no translations from anywhere. ( Snicker! ) It was all a manufactured, plagiarized works and claims. Not an ounce of factual evidence to any claim.
My evidence came from these sources: See this list http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,1495158,1496151#msg-1496151
Plus web pages that gave info from those sources also.

The pattern of the Snake Oil Salesman works because humans are naturally gullible, attracted to someone who claims some special knowledge from God and want to be attached to something special--esoteric, religiously. (We see businesses today being caught up in big law suits for trying to sell a hoax, false claims!)

Now that the real information is readily available, (Hello Google God!), that "spiritual witness", in some cases, still cannot be dented. The info is seen as tainted or unreliable from the beginning. (This was true of my husband.) The faith based spiritual witness is very powerful. It is hermetically sealed/seared into the thinking of the person from birth. (This applies to all religious beliefs by faith, in my observation.) This made no sense to me as my husband was an engineer, scientist of sorts, understood physics, but that information was not allowed to infringe on his faith based beliefs since birth. The faith based claims seemed to be genetically transferred in his DNA from generation to generation as his history with the LDS Church went back to Nauvoo, seven generations. It had to be true. There was no question about it and no questioning as that meant questioning God - Heavenly Father.

I understand why some people cannot see the information that is presented as valid as it is incompatible with their preconceived acceptable conclusions. That's the power of faith.That spiritual witness to the claims by faith is so powerful it can completely discount any information that does not support them. Besides, what has been ingrained as right, true, and acceptable does not easily change to: wrong, false, and unacceptable. This takes some people a long time to digest. It's difficult to see it happen in our loved ones also. People need a lot of time to adjust to major changes.

That was the situation I found myself dealing with. I soon realized that my methods were failing and I needed to apply some basic successful human relationship techniques: respect and honor his rights to his beliefs just as I wanted for me, engage the Golden Rule: treat him the way I wanted to be treated, and as adults, we could come to different conclusions so we made an agreement to Agree to Disagree! I began to understand that he considered his underwear his choice and part of his commitment, while I found it to represent something I had changed my mind about. So I got rid of mine.
This worked for the last 15 plus lives of our marriage before he passed away two years ago.

It as hard at first, I'm a "fix-it" personality, noisy and happy to share information. But, he was not buying what I was selling! So we both adjusted. It was not easy for me, I was making a lot of changes, and he was not. I found if I learned to be respectful of his beliefs, not challenge him as it caused him a lot of stress, and shared funny experiences about the religion, he saw that I was not trying infringe on his core beliefs. It was OK for him to believe what he wanted. This was one of the smartest things I did to cement our relationship on positive ground. I was not going to give up my investment, either. And so, I supported what he wanted and he supported me. I just shared a post on how he bought me a coffee maker and surprised the socks off me!
Our relationship and family and investment in our lives was always so much more important that a difference of opinion over beliefs by faith.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/29/2015 02:00PM by SusieQ#1.

As always, a well written post! Thank you.

My theory is that Mormons "activate" their spirituality because they worship the cult, because that is the way they've been raised/indoctrinated. Its similar to how a child may still love an abusive parent. The cult member has an emotional connection to the cult, first and foremost. The cult provides too many emotional rewards.

Some of these emotional rewards are feeling special because they have secret information. Some feel superior because of that. Some ego gratify by leadership climbing. Some are busy trying to prove to themselves and others that they are good and worthy, even more worthy than other members. Some become judgmental because of these new commandments the cult expects compliance with, such as no coffee, alcohol, temple stuff, callings, thing, talks, extra meetings, having lots of kids, being able to brag about your children that have served a mission and had a temple marriage...

Since leaving, I have discovered that Christians activate their spirituality/ have an emotional connection to worshipping Jesus.

It takes a lot in a person to change from an emotional connection person to a fact based connection.

Religious belief systems are ingrained in our thinking, generally from birth. It's part of how the family and it's culture and traditions become part of their lives. Each one is somewhat different, and plays a bigger or lesser part in the person's live. This is true all over the world. The religious culture dictates all of the family traditions around birth, coming of age, marriage and death. (A quick study shows they very widely around the world. All are seen as important in their specific culture.)

Of course, all religions are "cults" of a sort.
cult: a system of religious veneration and devotion directed toward a particular figure or object

I'm more of a purest when discussing religions. I refrain from using terms that are seen as derogatory or pejorative by any believer out of courtesy and credibility.

The emotional connection to a belief system is historically a constant in the development of the individual in the family around the world. Food, clothing, special writings,music, intricate traditions are all intrinsically woven into the persons life. This is true in the world of Mormonism also.

The faith based beliefs are never about factual evidences. It's almost always a visionary, spiritual teacher that is given a special place in their lives and their advice followed in some degree from the very orthodox to the more liberal.

Many years ago, I spoke with a generational Mormon related to a well known writer. I remarked that: "Joseph Smith Jr didn't have any real golden plates". He replied: "He didn't have to." In essence, that is true. The "spiritual witness" from the get-go which continues today is sufficient.

The religion is almost always about living a right way, (such as in Buddhism) or pleasing a deity/s or savior as in most other religions. Historically, human beings spend much of their lives in one of these pursuits, which they consider sacred.

Naturally, it is difficult to let go of a faith-based claim especially if it's generational, (sometimes for thousands of years) accepted as truth, what is right. The extensive traditions of dress/costuming, music, architecture, etc.all work to cement a life long acceptance.

Fortunately, because of The Information Age and access to a lot more information we are capable of changing our mind about our choices and decisions about religious faith based beliefs. Some even call it an Enlightened Age. Perhaps that is true.

I understand and recognize the value that people place in their religious belief systems. It is the core of their whole life, in many cases. This is historically true and still true in probably most areas of the world. They cement the family and extended family relationships through their many traditions that in many cases, are carried out in exactness.

I'm grateful that I have access to information to make different choices and decisions about a lot of topics. Happy I still have two brain-cells left to rub together... for awhile anyhow! :-)

I will continue to respect the rights of others, civil rights, all of the human rights that each of us are entitled to. I'm grateful I live in a country where those are generally validated and I can express myself freely without fear of recrimination by some outside authority.

In other words, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Your hubby values his faith over facts. The long Mormon heritage may have something to do with it too. Family traits are passed along at a transcendent level in the morphogenetic field. Basically, he resonates with the beliefs of his ancestors. That's called Lamarckian evolution, which was discarded after Darwin but is making a comeback.

If he was a hard core TBM at age 27, when his prefrontal cortex "hardened", he's hard wired for Mormonism. He can't just rewire his circuits.

bradley

You may have missed my point: Faith based claims are not, nor ever dependent on factual evidence. That is true consistently throughout history. It's about special esoteric knowledge from a deity, generally (or some special enlightened teacher) that is accepted as valid.
People attach themselves to these beliefs for many reasons: it is all they know, familial solidarity, survival, emotional support, etc. etc. The outcast is often not able to survive on many levels, especially, in the past.
I'm also for keeping faith based beliefs as it is a right of all humans.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/29/2015 03:18PM by SusieQ#1.

Yup. People have a right to make up their own minds. Apostates aren't entitled to use the Mormon hammer.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/30/2015 03:39PM by bradley.

bradley Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yup. People have a right to make up their own
> minds. Apostates aren't entitled to use the Mormon
> hammer.

Scratching my head.... ????

bradley Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> In other words, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
> Your hubby values his faith over facts. The long
> Mormon heritage may have something to do with it
> too. Family traits are passed along at a
> transcendent level in the morphogenetic field.
> Basically, he resonates with the beliefs of his
> ancestors. That's called Lamarckian evolution,
> which was discarded after Darwin but is making a
> comeback.
>
> If he was a hard core TBM at age 27, when his
> prefrontal cortex "hardened", he's hard wired for
> Mormonism. He can't just rewire his circuits.

It's apparent that a lot of people rewrite their circuits listening to the stories on this board, alone.
It can be done, it is done, I did it, and others do it.