On a scale of 1 to 100, how Mormon were you?

1 = Almost never believed a single thing about the fraud.

100 = Believed every damn lie taught.

Please search your soul and answer as accurately as possible.

Thank you.

http://valerietarico.com/2012/10/05/the-same-god-twelve-beliefs-mormons-might-not-want-you-to-know-about/

Me? I was 99.999 pure Momo. That .001 portion saved me.

25%. Learned from growing up that I had to pretend to be 100%, but exhibited about 75-80% because there were somethings which were just so dumb.

90%. I always wanted to know "the mysteries". They were a-l-w-a-y-s disappointing.

100% every damn lie.

And that's the honest truth. My primary teachers, Sunday School teachers, MIA teachers, you name it teachers, were all so damn sincere themselves.

How could those early childhood teachers be so fundamentally flawed themselves?

I used to preach to my classmates in the bathroom and playground in the third grade. My third grade [very Mormon] teacher was so impressed with me she told my parents I'd be a great leader of the church someday (lol.)

And she told them I had the makings of a brain surgeon. Now I get sick at the sight of blood, and [always] sucked at science and math. Albeit I know enough to balance my checkbook most of the time. :P

I believed 100% in the testimony of my first bishop, and a few others who were like him.

But then it came to pass that I figured out that just because others believe in something doesn't make it true.

I'd say 90%

Only 90% because I got bad grades and laughed loudly at inappropriate jokes ;) I did buy into all church stuff lock, stock and barrel though.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/28/2015 01:19PM by brandywine.

Almost 1

Infant through mission - I'd say 90% - I thought alot of it was quite goofy.

From mission to 30 years old - I'd say 70% - I saw a lot of hypocracy and stuff that didn't make sense

From 30-50 - I'd put it as maybe 20%. Totally faked it. Hated the whole thing. Had some good friends though that made it tolerable...but hated the mormon culture (including Utah) and the temple and anything related to it (garments, interviews, white shirts, etc.).

This is an interesting answer.

I'd say that I was 80% throughout my youth - 90% if you don't count adherence to Mormon cultural norms - but the mission field exposed me to the massive anti-intuitive/spiritual bureaucracy, the paint-by-numbers, philosophy of the church, which blasted a huge hole in my testimony.

Once my mission was complete, I'd say my testimony was at 70% at best, but the veil was rent, my vision became focalized and suddenly I could more clearly see the imperfect details of doctrine and history.

I had a philosophical break from the church in 2008 and was secretly divorced from Mormonism a year or two later. I came out to my wife in 2011, and we have both been out since 2013 or so.

Converted at 15 years old: 100%

Served mission: 90%

Returned from mission: 80%

Went to BYU & got married: 70%

Had a kid: 60%

Got close up look at "inspired" local
and general leadership: 50%

Encountered empty answers to real-life questions: 40%

Studied more intensely to understand
gospel in the face of personal trials: 30%

Counseled with Bishop about personal trials: 20%

Tried praying with more faith: 10%

Got online: 0%

leftfield Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Converted at 15 years old: 100%
>
> Served mission: 90%
>
> Returned from mission: 80%
>
> Went to BYU & got married: 70%
>
> Had a kid: 60%
>
> Got close up look at "inspired" local
> and general leadership: 50%
>
> Encountered empty answers to real-life questions:
> 40%
>
> Studied more intensely to understand
> gospel in the face of personal trials: 30%
>
> Counseled with Bishop about personal trials: 20%
>
> Tried praying with more faith: 10%
>
> Got online: 0%


Fantastic countdown. THANKS!!!

You're welcome.

It seemed more useful that giving you an average or the peak rating.

10-20

Only converted because misery loves company. If I had known about the stupid crap like banning from all R rated movies and blind like and hatred towards republicans and democrats, respectively, I would not have joined at all.

From birth to about age 10, I was a 100.
From about age 10 to about age 16, I was an 80.
From age 16 to my "temple endowments," I was a 70.
From temple endowments to the middle of my mission, I was a 50.
From middle of my mission to end of my mission, I was a 30.
Three months after my mission, I was a 0.

:)

LOL as I visualize the graph of belief vs time over some of your lives. Makes for a haunting visual.

I was never more than lukewarm, 50% at best.

brothernotofjared Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> LOL as I visualize the graph of belief vs time
> over some of your lives. Makes for a haunting
> visual.

My drop from 100 to 80 between 10 and 16 years old is easy to explain:
I discovered girls ;-)

>
> I was never more than lukewarm, 50% at best.

You were smarter than I was, then. I fell for all of it for some time. :(

I was only at most throughout my life 15% Mormon. I'm still a teen and back when I converted I hated the church for its awful boringness. I was really glad to hear that it was all a lie.

Pretended to be 100% my whole life - went out of state to college away from my freakish family and acted like my true self which was 0%.

Came home, acted 100% TBM to keep the peace with my family and even got married in the temple to a RM.
Hated him, he hated me. But truthfully we had zero business getting married.

Got divorced and excommunicated 30+ years ago. Today I consider myself 0% TBM again and proud of it.

I was 110% in my wackiest most desperate time. However the hope that there is something like an eternal family kept it up. Today I know better and that a good Traumtherapy would have been a better help than going on a mission.
Then I learned about "celestial marriage" - studied Mormon Doctrine and somehow it totally doesn't fit the pictures in my head. Started to question the authority and the doctrine let it shrink incredible fast to maybe 25%, then online was a source that opened up my eyes more and finally due to the aweful bigotry of the TBMs and PH it decreased to zero.

I'd say about 50% because the missionaries were careful not to teach all/most of the lies to a new convert. There were so many of the lies I'd never even heard about until I went to BYU and even then I thought most of the things taught as doctrine were just made-up. I didn't think anyone truly believed all those things until I moved back to Utah as an adult and lived there. That's when I truly became astonished that people in Utah swallowed it all. I still believed the big stuff like the BofM being real and J.S. being a prophet but the stuff added on by following prophets like Brig. Y. seemed unthinkable. Had I not moved to Utah I might still be a happy 50% believer

I guess I was always bound to have a crisis of faith eventually but, DANG, it took me way too long.

Growing up in the church I was probably around 90%. I really believed most of it was true, but there were some things I just couldn't wrap my head around. When I finally had the guts to research some of the issues on the internet, it took about five minutes for my Mormonism to drop from 90% down to 0%.

+1

Just before me leaving in 2005, I was the BEST Mormon single women there was this side of the Rockies .

I would put me at the 120%.

Growing up, I didnt have that "knowledge" that everyone else says they had. I never had the witness from the HG and thought it would eventually come but thought that I wasnt getting an answer because of sins in my life. At that time, I say I was still 90% though.

After my mission I was 100% probably for the next 2-3 years and then it started to go down hill from there to where I am now.

100% for most of my life. I went to every activity, Seminary, Institute, married in the temple, the whole bit. I taught RS, Nursery, stake missionary, ward missionary, tons of callings, I took them all and did my best.

Once I got married and had kids, checked all my "eternal boxes" I began to realize that being a fulltime SAHM with tons of kids wasn't what I wanted out of life and I went back to college. I took a ton of flack for that from my leaders and fellow members but I still believed everything and was an active member. I went to the temple often trying to find peace there but I always came away feeling worthless and unlucky for having been born a female.

Once I started studying the Bible and Christianity and religion in general my faith fell apart to 0% within a month.

For me it was a left brain/right brain thing. At my peak, I was never more than around 85% (and often much lower), but for many, many years, I kept telling myself that I was 100%.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/28/2015 09:53PM by CrispingPin.

I probably peaked around 10 or 15% at most.

Grew up with inactive, liberal BiC parents who never baptized me but would occasionally take me to Church or family/friend events. Got baptized freshman year of college after getting involved in an LDS Student Association. Went on a mission for the experience of living overseas. Continued being active for the social environment. Slowly exiting as I've decided I don't want my future kids to be involved.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/2015 09:59AM by levantlurker.

"Went on a mission for the experience of living overseas."

I may be lying to myself. Most likely it was my way of rebelling against my parents and wanting to feel like a legitimate member of my "tribe".

Ages:

1-10: 100
11-21: 90
21-31: 75 (temple)
32-40: 50
41: 25
42: 20
43: 15
44: 10
45: 5
46-forever: 0

I would have dropped everything and walked to Missouri.

100% up until the day I left the church. I never ever doubted the church, only doubted my "weak self." It took approximately twenty minutes to go from 100 to 0. It was the biggest relief of my life and I hit the ground running.

RM, BYU grad, but I don't think there was ever a time I really bought it hook line and sinker

I'd say it was about a 1, since like most converts, I didn't stay in very long, and there's no way I could ever force myself to believe a lot of that stuff in order to return to Mormonism.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/2015 12:48PM by adoylelb.

I was most definitely a 1. Had a rebellious streak in me, plus I never paid attention to much of what was preached. I was not required to read the BofM or the Bible...so I never did. Rules are a problem and Mormonism is rife with them so that wasn't gonna work.

Ron Burr

I believed most things, but I was uncomfortable about quite a bit. The racism and polygamy bothered me. As I became an adult, the sexism bothered me.

I loved Book of Mormon stories when I was a kid, but I was never comfortable with JS. JS was the key to my unbelief, as he seemed narcissistic and sketchy to begin with. My belief in the Book of Mormon collapsed because of JS's bio, not the other way around.

I also had a hard time with the blind obedience thing. I do not do well with "because I told you so". I had a tough time on my mission because many policies seemed wrong and unfair, but questioning them was a sign of apostasy.

Probably 90%

As an young married mom working FT evening shift, I missed out on almost every relief society event. The rare times that I wasn't working during enrichment, you couldn't have dragged me away from my family to be at church. I also hated visiting teaching. So in spite of going along with the program for the most part, there was a part of me that just couldn't do the R.S. crap.