Posted by:
megan funck
(
)
Date: July 26, 2012 09:54PM
Part 1
After being a member of the LDS church for twenty-two years, I left. Not just stopped going, but legally resigned. I know that a lot members of the church have a difficult time understanding why someone would choose to resign. I’ve heard a lot of speculations dished out, such as “They must have never had that strong of a testimony,” or “They probably just want to sin”, etc. While these may be true in some cases (although people in this category don’t normally resign, they just “go inactive”), it is denying the fact that there are legitimate doctrinal/spiritual/historical reasons as to why people would leave the church.
Here’s my own story.
Now, I wasn’t just some half-assed, wishy-washy Mormon . I can honestly say believed in everything the church claimed to be. I “knew” it was true. I was married in the temple at the age of twenty. My husband and I moved to Los Angeles, where I attended the temple once a week. I spent time daily reading the scriptures and church books. I was proud to announce my Mormon-ness to anyone who would listen, and stood up for it when people made fun of it. I believed very strongly that the church was literally the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.
I believed because, well, it felt good. I experienced what is referred to as “the spirit” (a warm, expansive feeling in my heart center) many times. I felt the spirit when reading the Book of Mormon and when I attended the temple. Other people’s stories of spiritual experiences within the church also strengthened my faith- people being healed after a priesthood blessing, encountering strange synchronicities, near-death experiences, etc.
I also thought it made sense at the time. So, why did I leave?
Well, I was looking for answers to questions I would sometimes get asked. For example:
“Why is your church racist?”
“Is it true John Smith (I love everyone always get Joseph Smith confused with John Smith) wrote the Mormon Bible by putting his face in a hat and looking at a stone like it showed on South Park?”
“How many wives can I have if I become Mormon?”
“How come there is no DNA evidence of Hebrews in the Americas?”
The list could go on. I wanted to be properly equipped to represent the church when I was asked these questions. I wanted to become knowledgeable about the church so I could be a beacon of light and understanding to anyone who needed questions answered. I stocked up on some books I found at the Beehive Bookstore- there was a collection of books published that dealt with these typical ‘taboo’ topics. I read them all and my curiosity was further piqued. I didn’t feel quite satisfied with all of the explanations given in these books, so I began searching on the internet.
I began scouring over the FAIR and FARMS websites (church apologist sites/associations). There were some very interesting topics to say the least! When I first began researching and reading their articles, I was optimistic, thinking to myself many times, “Well, I suppose that could make sense!”. However, after a lot of reading I finally had to admit to myself that most of their explanations were…well, embarrassingly weak. I was disappointed. Couldn’t they do better than that? After this, my entire life became wrapped up in researching and studying the history of the church.
It was fascinating. Some things I discovered made me appreciate the church even more- like the fact that in the early years of the church it was common and accepted for women to give Priesthood blessings. I read some stellar books- Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling by Richard Bushman, The Mormon Hierarchy- Origins of Power by Michael Quinn., Mormon Enigma: Emma Hale Smith by Linda Newell, Early Mormonism and the Magical World View by Quinn, and many others. It was disturbing to find out that some of these authors, who were members of the church and historians, had been excommunicated for writing and publishing completely factual, but unflattering historical information about the church.
I was torn. It had become blatantly evident that the Church was purposefully whitewashing information and twisting it around in a way to make the church appear in the best light possible. Why would the church do this? I was incredulous that I had learned more about the history of the church in a matter of months by just reading actual history than the twenty-two years I spent in the church.
There was a lot of information that seriously distressed me. These were not small, minor things that could easily be discounted by saying, “Well, the church is perfect, it’s the people that aren’t!” I was discovering things that challenged the basic beginnings and fundamental tenets of Mormonism.
( I feel its necessary to add that I stayed away from any blatant anti-Mormon literature. Most genuine anti-Mormon stuff is written by Evangelical Christians trying to “save” Mormons, and are- well, how to put it…bat-shit crazy!)
Up until this point, I had only theoretically toyed with the idea that the church might not be exactly everything it claimed to be. Over the months I had slowly become more distraught that the church had been whitewashing it’s history. I kept praying to God to help me understand why. Why had all of these horrible things happened in church history, by the hands of church leaders? Why were there so many incidents and facts that challenged the idea of Joseph Smith being a true prophet, and restoring the gospel? I tried bargaining with myself. I’d think “Well, maybe none of these historical things are true at all, and it’s just a way of God testing my faith!” or “Maybe God allowed these things to happen, as a way to test the faith of the members!”. I went on like this for a while. But- after doing mental gymnastics trying to wrap my brain around all of it, I had to admit that this was just getting ridiculous. I was desperately trying to convince myself that something was “true“, despite all odds.
I made the difficult decision to “allow” myself to genuinely question the church. At first, I felt guilty. But, after some soul-searching and reality-checking, I realized that the God I knew and loved would want me to question. How else could Joseph Smith have even possibly restored the church, had he not questioned the church’s of his time? Some may wonder, “Didn’t you already get an answer about the truthfulness of the church? How can you then doubt?” When my beliefs about the church were earlier formed, I simply didn’t have all the information. I was not fully informed. Now that I was equipped with information from all sides of the story, I felt there was a strong need to reevaluate my conviction in the church. Honestly, had I been an investigator of the church and had known what I knew now, there wouldn’t even be a need to pray to ask God if the church was the restored gospel of Christ, because it would have just seemed too silly and blatantly obviously wrong to even consider it being “true”.
I had most definitely felt the spirit on numerous occasions. However, I had an epiphany that this phenomenon I knew of as “the Spirit”, was not exclusive to the Mormon religion, and that it was not the wisest idea to base 100% of my faith in the church off of it. I had felt “the spirit” many times outside the realms of the church- when watching Titanic, when crowd-surfing at a rock concert, when writing a song on the guitar, when singing in the high school choir. People of other religions experienced these feelings as well, based their faith off of it, and believed in their religion just as strongly (if not stronger) than Mormons. Hell, some people were even willing to strap a bomb to themselves and blow up in the name of religion.
So why should I believe in the first religion that fell in my lap, which I had been raised in? I allowed myself to ask “What if, I have been essentially indoctrinated to believe in this religion?” What would actually be the chances that I had somehow just happened to be born into a family, who just happened to belong to the one and only “true” church, over everyone else in the world?
Then came the depression. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat. I began having anxiety and panic attacks. My whole reality was shattering before me, and there was nothing I could do about it. My neat and tidy pre-fabricated world view that I had let the church spoon-feed me was disintegrating into nothing.
I started reading about cults and mind-control tactics. When people think of cults, they usually think of outwardly obvious creepy groups, like Heaven’s Gate or Jim Jones. The Mormon church is not necessarily outwardly cult-ish, but I realized, that in my case, I had been allowing my mind, and my life experience, to be controlled by the church (This may or may not be true for other members. This is just my experience. I believe it’s possible to be a member and still retain a connection to your sense of logic, personal integrity, and self, without automatically believing everything the church spoon feeds you. I applaud these members!)
I couldn’t believe in the Church anymore. I just couldn’t. So, I decided to leave. Remaining in the church was no longer a matter of faith, it was now a matter of me staying true to my self and my own sense of integrity. I was after truth, and I wasn’t going to settle for less.
I wasn’t sure what to believe anymore, but I felt positive that if I died and it turned out the church was true, I could confidently stand before God, with a clear conscience, and that he would understand I did my absolute best to seek the truth, and be a good person.
I remember my last Sunday at church. It was Easter. In Sunday School Sharing time, a lady was teaching about Emma Hale Smith, praising her for being such a wonderful example and faithful member of the church her whole life. I had to bite my lip, after Joseph’s death, Emma refused to sustain Brigham Young as the new prophet (who wanted to take her as one of his wives), instead following her son who started what is now known as the Reformed Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. When I walked out of the double-doors into the warm sun, I didn’t turn to look back.