I haven’t darkened a Mormon Church building in 12 years. I moved twice and never told anyone my address. Missionaries showed up at my place tonight. It’s officially time to resign - sending the email tomorrow. I’m not even mad, I’m just genuinely confused on how they found me.

Most likely public records. The church corporate apparatus like other corporations have departments dedicated solely to finding lost people for whatever reason/s.

Resigning will get em off your back for now. Later after you're long gone and buried (or cremated,) they'll post-humously rebaptize you back despite it being against your wishes.

That ought to be criminalized!

When the missionaries asked me for...well...me...I gave a fake name. They seemed to believe me and left. How much information do I have to give them in my resignation email? I don’t have my baptism date or my membership number. Do I have to give them my current address, or could I get by just telling them what town I’m currently in?

The missionaries aren't going to be notified you sent in a resignation e-mail. Resignations go through SLC. SLC may tell you your stake president will want to interview you, but that's rubbish. Once they get your e-mail, you're out.

Your name will drop off the rolls, and that will be that.

TSCC thinks that resignation is a "local ecclesiastical matter". Therefore, they will send your resignation to your SP to be forwarded to your bishop for processing. As a result, they need to know which ward boundaries you reside in. If your town only has one ward, then they will know where to send it, but if it has more than one ward, they will want your actual address to determine who to send it to.

either a relative "ratted you out" or they did a search on a site such as lexis nexis.

There is no such thing as anonymity.

Make sure you give them enough information so you can be identified from the millions of other records on file.

You won't need your baptism date, but your date of birth and your name on the member rolls.

I doubt you'd need to give them your current mailing address if you use e-mail with enough identifying information that your name gets removed according to your wishes.

That will get them to stop sending home teachers. I'm not sure about missionaries since they look for converts or to reconvert ex-Mormons. I keep a "No Soliciting" sign on my door. It works most of the time.

I'm not kidding. The codgers each have eight hours a day, a computer, phone, and training for finding innocent exmos who want to be left alone.

If they lose track of someone, they turn the name into these "volunteer spies."

It's good you're officially resigning. That should help if you want to be left alone.

I genuinely just wanted to slip into the shadows and let the church and I forget each other. I was actually getting pretty close to that point before today. I guess the church is like Beetlejuice, though...I must have thought of it 3 times and then it shows up. I don’t want to have any more nasty exchanges with Mormons - the missionaries that showed up today seemed like genuinely nice kids and I’ve told off enough self righteous elder’s quorum dicks to last me a lifetime. At this point, the church is forcing me to hurt its feelings, but I really feel like I don’t have a choice anymore.

Did they ask for you by name?

I had some show up three years ago. They didn't know who they were looking for. Just had an address.

They asked for me by my first name. I politely told them I didn’t know anyone by that name and sent them on their way. I’d like to think that will be the last I see of them, but experience tells me they will be back...soon.

I would make a fake email, so that a long-term, legitimate email address is not recorded by LDS, and never shared (by you) with them. You can choose to look at or ignore that me_quitting_lds@whatever.. email as you wish. You can set it to forward email to your regular email until you receive your "out" confirmation, but always respond from the fake addy.

Give them no concrete ties between your real name and other personally identifying information (bd, old/current mailing address), and an email you may use for business or other legitimate contacts.

I was a membership clerk for 7 years. You can always be found if you have an internet footprint. Email, social media, public records of any kind. Buying a house, registering a home business with your city or county, forwarding your mail to your new address when you move.....those are the most common ways to track down members. Also, are you registered to vote? Voting records are public information in most States and it includes your address. In most cases this would be considered stalking, but as with most things with religion, they get a free pass.

UPDATE: Resignation submitted using the Quit Mormon site. Looking forward to getting my confirmation after they work through the backlog of other resignations!

Congrats!! Resignation is pretty effective for getting left alone.

I know a lot of exmos feel that they shouldn't have to jump through hoops, but they force your hand.

My theory is that the uppity ups have been directed to make only feeble attempts to get a leaving member to return.

They've got to know that we are in a position to dish out some damaging facts.

I love knowing that no one can claim that they are my visiting teacher, home teacher, bishop etc.

I scrap booked my final letter.

Feels fabulous.

I've sent email resignation after email resignation without any response or confirmation. Let us know if you get one.

"I’m just genuinely confused on how they found me."

That is exactly how I felt. I had moved twice. They even got my email address.

Having my name removed was such a great decision. In two years I have not been pestered once. Good luck!!