[I previously posted a longer bio on the old board but here's a simpler one since the old one is gone]

I was a sixth generation Mormon, born and raised in Utah. My wife’s Mormon background also goes back five and six generations to the earliest days of the church in the 1830s in Ohio and Missouri. Both of us were lifelong active members of the church who never went through any periods of inactivity or even a teen rebellious phase until we left the church and officially resigned our membership along with our three children in 2010.

I was baptized at age eight. I was ordained to all the Aaronic priesthood offices and served in youth presidencies throughout my youth. I attended and graduated from seminary. I served as a full time missionary in Japan. My wife and I married in the temple. I served in one or more church callings continuously my entire adult life right up until I decided I no longer believed in the claims of the Mormon Church. I served as a primary teacher, in the young men’s presidency, ward clerk (twice), stake missionary (the calling I hated most), in the branch presidency and on the district council. My wife served at various times as the primary president, young women’s president, counselor in the primary and young women’s presidencies, primary teacher and so forth. In other words we were dedicated and committed worker bees of the wards and branches where we went to church.

Like many members I’d encountered various problematic issues with the church and put them on the proverbial mental shelf for future consideration telling myself that God would sort it all out and explain it eventually, even if eventually was after I was dead, and I continued to choose to believe even though generally speaking I fulfilled my church responsibilities our of a sense of duty and the fact that I wanted to do the “right” thing even though it often made me uncomfortable and added stress and anxiety to my life.

I had one particular experience when serving in the branch presidency. I was sitting in Sunday School half listening to the lesson and half reading the Book of Mormon. Suddenly a minor discrepancy in the Book of Mormon related to its chronology jumped out at me and reminded me of a similar situation in a non-church related situation as a child where my previous erroneous childish view was the only explanation I could think of to explain the Book of Mormon discrepancy that I noticed. I almost immediately thought that such an error in the Book of Mormon was more in line with the commonly mentioned uneducated 14 year old boy writing it than with it being a true story of a true people. If this particular discrepancy were the only thing “wrong” with the church, its scriptures and its history then I could easily have ignored it. However this experience was something of a trigger event, I guess. This event brought that mental shelf where I’d filed other problems crashing down.

I spent most of the next two years trying desperately to reinforce my belief, reconcile perceived church problems and build up my faith. I did so by praying, reading scriptures, completing the Book of Mormon cover to cover twice in a short time, more faithfully attempting to fulfill my callings and otherwise doing everything the church told me I should do to increase my faith and testimony. I also tried to research the various doctrinal and historic problems that I had decided needed to be answered now and I purposefully restricted my study to official or church friendly sources. It didn’t work. The minute a person starts to objectively look at the church without a preconceived result in mind, namely that it’s true and they’re just looking for something to back that up, the results are unavoidable and point to the false nature of most church claims.

Finally, I admitted to myself that I just couldn’t believe the fairy tale anymore. I turned down the next calling I was offered and I hinted at my questions and issues to my still believing wife until finally I just said I didn’t believe anymore. She didn’t take the news very well and her first response was to ask “so, should I divorce you now?”

The next two years were a bit tense. I continued to attend church to support my wife, and even met with the bishop at her request but was clear in that meeting with the bishop that I didn’t really believe it anymore, but would do what my wife asked and still go if she wanted me to. When not with my wife at church I spent my time in the foyer reading. My integrity didn’t allow me to pretend to believe, even though I was physically present. When possible I would drop in “the rest of the story” during Sunday school lessons and such giving my wife the opportunity to weigh the evidence herself and she soon started to question the church too, although she expressed a desire to continue to attend for social reasons. But, we found that the church isn’t very accepting of admitted non-believers even in a social setting and when the opportunity to move cross country for a new job arose we took it.

The last week in our old home before moving, I drove to the church at a time when I knew I could catch the bishop, who was also our neighbor, in between meetings. I sat down with him for about five minutes and handed him a resignation letter for myself, my wife and our three kids. The next week we moved and two months later, with only one minor administrative glitch, we received confirmation from the church that we were no longer members.

There’s a lot more in my life that could be discussed regarding the church and my exit from it including its influence on my career and other significant life choices. Overall, however, life is much better. Except for our church attendance and membership there have been no major changes in our lives. We like to point out to our family and friends that we’re basically still the same people we were before and we haven’t turned into depraved drug addicted evil fiends.

Bottom line; I eventually grew up and life is so much better without all those pretty lies.

Lyrics from "Goodbye Alice in Wonderland" by Jewel -

Growing up is not the absence of dreaming,
its being able to understand the difference between
the ones you can hold and the ones that you've been sold.
Dreaming is a good thing cause it brings new things to life,
but pretending is an ending that perpetuates a lie,
forgetting what you're seeing for what you've been told.
Truth is stranger than fiction
This is my chance to get it right.
Life is much better without all those pretty lies.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/07/2011 05:15PM by Scott.T.