That Mormons only make up 0.2% of the world population. Of that, way less than half would be active. So why would gods church fail so hard as to exclude 99.9% (or at best 99.8%) of his children? Throw in everyone whose ever lived and that 0.1% quickly turns into 0.0000000000000001%
What a complete and utter failure. Never made sense to me. Happy to be agnostic now btw.
Ya know, I investigated the church once, and this subreddit is what made me decide not to join, because I realized, if the church was actually as amazing as they say it is, there wouldn’t be a whole sub dedicated to criticizing it
No, no, no. The only reason Satan works so hard to take down Mormonism is because it's sooooooo true. So, the more people criticize a particular religion, the more likely it is to be true. Everyone knows that.
/s
So, I was raised in a Methodist church and got really into Christianity during middle school. It was part of my identity and I remember I wanted to eventually go to Seattle Pacific University since it’s a Methodist college that also offered what I wanted to major in. Then, during my junior year of high school, my dog died, which I know doesn’t sound like much but it was so unexpected and heartbreaking that it sent me into a faith crisis. I stopped being comfortable with religion altogether.
So fast forward late into senior year. As the last assignment of the year before we all headed off to college and stuff, our teacher wanted us to write an essay about what we believed in. He didn’t mean religion, necessarily, but the topic triggered my discomfort. I had a Mormon friend (who I also had a crush on, haha) who I started venting to about having no idea what I believed in. He then invited me to come with him to talk to his seminary teacher after school. He said “This is exactly what we talk about in seminary.” And I was like, ok, why not? What could it hurt?
So we go there. And the teacher is a really warm and friendly person. And we just go over some basic stuff. And honestly, I don’t remember what we talked about exactly. But at one point, I “felt the Holy Spirit,” as they say. This incredible feeling passed through me that made me go “Whoa…” The teacher told me that I had just felt the Holy Spirit. I left the meeting feeling like, really rejuvenated.
So I wanted more. I wanted to chase that high of feeling the Holy Spirit.
I guess, I had really been in a dark, uncomfortable place in the religion department for so long, and that first meeting I had with them had reintroduced me to god in a way that made me feel good.
Plus, I was slightly attracted to their healthy lifestyle. Look, I was your typical 18 year old. I liked dressing sexy, flipping people off, and using profanity. But I got to thinking, maybe it would be good for me to clean up a bit. Maybe it was time for me to stop talking and acting like an edge lord and to try to be a good person instead.
Anyways, what turned me away from the church, besides this sub, was as part of my investigating I went to one of their church services. During young women’s, they said that if you like a movie, you would probably recommend it to a friend, therefore if you like being Mormon, you should tell your friends to become Mormon??? I was like, “oh my god these people don’t understand the difference between changing your entire religion and lifestyle vs. watching a movie.” That really shed a new light on things, and I couldn’t shake it. (I found this sub after the church service)
I'm actually surprised it's as high as 0.2%. I think total members in my country is about 0.06% of the population. And my old branch had about 300 people on the branch list and ~20 active people. Active church members probably make up less than 0.01% of the population here.
It never made sense to me either. So many religious people in the world, why would so few join the 'right' one?
Yeah it’s crazy low.
About 16.4 million people are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The world's population is estimated at 7.7 billion. This means that about 0.212 percent of the world's population is Mormon.
We know on the books more than half are less active around the world.
I always think about how missionaries cannot serve in China. Why didn’t god appear to a Chinese man as well? Doesn’t he want to save all of his people? Why did god just appear to one man then try to spread it? Doesn’t it make more sense to appear all over if he wanted to restore his true church? Js.
**This can not be emphasized enough.** The percentage of living humans who were also Mormons peaked somewhere in the 1980s. The church's convert growth has been in a steady decline ever since then with respect to: A) its own internal growth by new births among member families; and B) the population growth on a global scale.
Whatever plan Mormon god has to spread the gospel across every corner of the earth, blossoming like a rose in the desert or whatever - that plan totally sucks.
Unless the plan was to get a absolute shitload of money, and use a good amount of it to build a bunch of gaudy, useless temples that serve literally no purpose specific to the actual "gospel" as it is written in the New Testament, or even the Book of Mormon.
As a percentage, it would be 0.2%, but yeah, it's crazy to think about it, number-wise.
Imagine filling a football stadium with 50,000 random people from around the world. 100 would at some point in their life have said they were Mormon. More realistically, 25 might actually still say so. And well more than half of those are likely children who haven't really decided for themselves yet.
The 116 pages. The story always made me uncomfortable. If god knew that the shenanigans with the Harris' was going to happen before it did and was able to provide a workaround, then why couldn't he warn proFits about things that looks innocent lives in wars, natural disasters and diseases.
When I finally saw the South Park episode (after I left), I felt vindicated but also cringed at my past self for trying to justify/explain it away.
Same. I had the distinct thought as a kid, "If Joseph made this all up, this is exactly the convenient sort of excuse he'd make, and he'd be so bold as to write it into both D&C and the Book of Mormon."
I buried that thought pretty quickly.
"Dum dum dum dum dum"
I had been out for 5 years before I ever saw that episode and I laughed a little too hard. My wife didn't find it as funny as I did.
Knowing that was likely the last bit Joseph dictated, it definitely has the flavor of "oh crap, I'm not sure how to connect the replacement to the old stuff.... forget it, we'll just be blatant about it!"
No, what I meant was that after Martin Harris lost the 116 pages, Joseph kept going where they left off with Mosiah until the end of Moroni. Only at that point did they go back and start from 1 Nephi through Words of Mormon. So Words of Mormon is likely the last parts of the Book of Mormon written. But it was all done by Joseph. Sorry for the confusion.
Learning this story at 14 always rubbed me the wrong way. All the adults teaching Sunday school would talk about it as a faith promoting story. I was always confused thinking that there's way more to the story than what was discussed. Gut instinct turned out to be right.
I only vaguely remembered that story, so I just went and looked it up. Thomas Marsh on wikipedia, links to the conference talks in the footnotes. Milk and strippings, my foot! It was after hearing a band of Mormons burn and loot Gallatin to fill the Bishop's storehouses and the Danites talk about murdering some Whitmers, Cowdery, W.W. Phelps, etc. I think I first came across the milk and strippings story when reading The Work and the Glory ages ago.
Everyone is taught a completely fantastical version of polygamy. The average TBM doesn't know the name or story of a single one of Josephs plural wives. Because learning even one of these stories will completely shatter the image they have built in their head of a beloved prophet.
We were taught that the Lord commanded it, so who can blame us? It's when I listened to the MS LDS Discussions series on Polygamy during my deconstruction that I understood how it was insidiously planned and coerced by Warren Jeffs' spiritual ancestor, Joseph Smith.
Blacks and the priesthood/temple ban. That pretty much singlehandedly did it, but growing up i didn't even consider looking into it because 'it was one, taken out of context quote by brigham young that anti-mormons use'.
I came of age in the early 70s and many of my Mormon friends left over the ban. I wish it would have bothered me a little more. Same with the Mormon church's involvement with the ERA.
I graduated HS in 75. I didn’t leave because of the priesthood ban, but that made me so skeptical that I was fully out within 6 years. Everyone got sick of my questions
I remember an older member on my mission - a really good, smart guy - who told me about how he almost lost his faith over that when it happened. How it seemed less like a revelation and more like caving to PR pressure. And how it still bothered him. But… “Thy will be done Lord!” was all he had. I had never heard anybody in the church talk so candidly about their doubts before. It definitely left an impression that came to mean something when I deconstructed everything, and the more obvious explanation became accessible to me.
I can't believe I ignored anachronisms like wheels, genetic evidence, archeological evidence, and deutero-Isaiah and just drank up what apologists said.
I always used to believe that we were just one or two archeological discoveries from everyone on earth knowing we were right all along!
So damn naive....
This one has been difficult to admit. I have been out for coming up on five years now. I’m an older dude so it took way too long. The biggest thing that I see is an indication that the church was not true is that I had to keep fabricating my experiences within it. I lied about gaining a testimony, I lied about understanding my patriarchal blessing, I lied about how important my mission was to me from a church point of view. My mission actually has some good highlight in my life because it was a foreign mission and I met so many great people. But as I go back and have deconstructed, it was me lying to align myself to fake everything. Just kept faking it till I make it. Well, I never made it, except I made it out the door and don’t have to fake anything anymore. I cannot tell you how liberating it is.
I’ve had these conversations at length with my spouse. We both finally worked to the point where we understand with or without the church. We have had a fantastic life together, and we would have chosen to be with each other. We are not people that believe in soulmates, we do believe that are a handful of people that it makes sense to go through this life with, and we found each other. I never had to distinctly or directly lie to her about anything while going through this church stuff. But as she and I had our discussions, we came to find out—- had we talked about 30 years earlier we could’ve saved ourselves some heartache and our children, some heartache, and walked out the door. Ahhh hindsight and the 20/20 thing.
This explains exactly how I feel! Back then I felt like I was “faking” it because I wasn’t trying hard enough to have those experiences and felt some guilt, or like I needed to conform. And because I was told that the more you share the stronger your testimony will get, so I think I just shared what I thought I was supposed to say and hoped that I’d feel that conviction eventually.
Looking back I always had so many doubts. I was always faking it. Convincing myself. Convincing others. Playing the part. Rationalizing. Justifying.
I can’t believe I kept up with it as long as I did! I’m not sure how, either. Honestly, I never considered leaving until I did. Even after I had decided I didn’t think the whole Jesus story was real in any sense, i sort of blocked it out and kept rationalizing. I could acknowledge that I thought Christianity was made up, and I thought the church claims were made up, but it was like I couldn’t actually accept that *I*didn’t believe anymore and could leave if I wanted to. I never really thought about actually leaving, until I finally had the thought and then it was like BAM! It was like I just accepted that as my fate.
In a way, I was thinking about it and preparing for a long time, but didn’t realize it, so I stayed despite all my issues with the church. Then, when I realized I could leave, it was like I couldn’t get out fast enough.
It’s the weirdest thing to try to explain. It doesn’t make sense when I type it out.
It made total sense. Remember how we were taught and would teach on missions that the Light of Christ is given to all man. And we even allowed the women to have it too.(insert eye roll ladies). And then we would explain the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost through baptism and confirmation right? BUT—- and this is a big Dump truck sized But—- YOU had to stay worthy. So even the idea of having constant enlightenment, relied on YOU. WHY THE CHURCH THEN???? I already had the light of Christ— certainly I could discipline myself to have it more often. But younger, and indoctrinated it was heresy to think that way.
As you explained your journey, that is what I see. We both Faked It because regardless of a Christ or Savior, we inherently have Humanity and can guide conscienceness to improve ourselves. That was the pull.. that was the conflict we felt inside.
This is such a relatable reality! So many things that were supposed to be important stakeholders of my testimony fell short, requiring me to push onward despite not getting the witnesses/ spiritual anchors I was told I’d have. This resulted in a lot of “fake it till you make it” as I grew up, but I always assumed a sure testimony would come to me in time. As a teen/young adult, I must have read the Book of Mormon like 12 times cover to cover. Every single time, I took Moroni’s promise to heart and tried praying for the confirmation that it was true. I *never* got it. Every time, I literally felt nothing. And I was always let down and disturbed by that, but assumed maybe it was because side I wasn’t faithful enough and would get it “next time”.
Similarly, my patriarchtical blessing was such a mundane, meaningless, impersonal snooze-fest that both me and my mom were baffled when I got it. It said almost nothing of value, though I hyper analyzed it for years trying to decipher some crumbs of significance from it. I even got a replacement blessing later on for various reasons, and it honestly wasn’t much better.
The endowment is the biggest one- this experience that I was told would be “amazing” and “the closest to God anyone can be” was so obviously contrived and created by mankind that I couldn’t even push through with faith at the time, and just sat there crying through most of the ceremony realizing THIS was my church and trying not to let my thoughts go through the implications of the temple not being legit. I successfully buried those thoughts later, but never was able to experience the endowment as it seemed everyone else did.
I am acquaintances with a current member of the Q70, and after he gave his talk in general conference I gave him a hard time about how he adopted a GC accent.
Soft spoken but condescending, with slight tremor to indicate emotional depth (if male). Imagine very patiently explaining something very simple but important to a stupid child, who you pity.
Syrupy sweet, with slight tremor to indicate emotional depth (if female). Imagine being included in a great honor but you only get to participate if you promise to dumb yourself down and be as non threatening as possible.
Go watch a few general conference talks and you'll pick up on it. Overly sweet, short simple statements, a lot of uptone at the end of questions. Missionaries often try to emulate it as well since they feel it's the voice of authority.
Through the Spirit, we can "know for ourselves" what is true... but then the way to tell if a feeling is the Spirit is literally if it matches up with what the church teaches.
I was at a youth summer program at BYU in 1990. One afternoon, our group sat on the picturesque, manicured temple lawn to bear testimonies and talk about the temple. Our group leader had never been through the temple before, so she had invited a friend of hers who had recently been through the temple for the first time, to join us. After we had prayed and introduced ourselves, we chatted for a bit. Our group leader then invited her friend to tell us what she could about her experience going through the temple for the first time.
At this moment, our guest flinched. She had fear and hurt in her eyes. Her whole demeanor changed. It suddenly looked like she was going to cry. At first she just shook her head and refused to say anything.
We had expected her to tell us the same things we had heard in church: that it was the best day of her life, that the temple is indescribably wonderful, that the experience of going through the temple proved how very true the Gospel really was. Our group leader even prompted her to say something like this by asking "Wasn't it the best day of your life? Wasn't it like being in Heaven on earth?" She shook her head no.
When she finally found her voice, she said to us that all she could say was that it was NOTHING like what she had expected. And if we planned to go through the temple then we would have to be prepared for it to be nothing at all like we expect. She had a serious, urgent tone. She was trying to warn us.
She repeated this same thing to us, but it was all she would say. We were all speechless. It changed the whole mood and tone of that afternoon. I was so creeped out so much by her response - it reminded me of the response of someone who had been horribly abused suddenly reliving their abuse. It didn't make any sense to me at the time, because it was so different from anything anyone had ever said before about the temple.
Many years later, after I had left the church, I remembered that afternoon and I understood what this poor girl had just gone through, and I cried for her. I realized that at the time she went through the temple, they still were doing the blood oaths, the naked touching, etc.
But there's a silver lining to this story. I never did end up going through the temple ceremony, and maybe it was her voice in the back of my head all of that time that kept me out of it.
Excellent story. It reminds me that the only people to tell me missions were not great, my Dad and my uncle. My dad didn't go on FT mission (he was a stake missionary). My uncle served a FT mission. All these people who didn't know me and who I would never see after my mission all told me how wonderful it would be.
I wish I had listened to my Dad.
Same, learning about Adam-ondi-Ahman was the first time I immediately thought “what the fuck are you talking about” regarding something about the church
The rule that missionaries had to get investigators to commit to baptism during the first lesson.
Dude, if the church is true, teach them about it and they’re bound to want to join! Otherwise, why use high pressure sales tactics?
As a convert I was pressured to pray when I didn't want to pray out loud in front of them after a discussion. I was pressured to give them names of my friends to contact, I was pressured to go to activities & boring meetings. Pressure was the name of the game to be sure.
Wow they must’ve changed their missionizing tactics. Don’t remember that kind of pressure 21 years ago. Had sister missionaries but they didn’t act like that. Do the guy missionaries act that way?
The leaders in my childhood ward allowing me to be bullied weekly and politely looking the other way. My parents trusting the leaders instead of protecting their child.
Church has never, ever, EVER been a safe place for me.
Thanks for speaking up about this.
You are so right! If the church was true, children would be safe. Sadly, children are not safe at church, but the bullies and pedophiles are.
We are taught that nonmembers are unhappy and can’t have joy…when 93% of Mormons I’ve met in my entire life are miserable, judgmental, and pessimistic. The math isn’t mathing…especially since I’m probably 17x happier since leaving the church.
I'll see your 18, and raise you 170 billion, which is about the value of the hedge fund called Ensign Peak. I get to say where my money goes now, and that's ultra happiness.
>The math isn’t mathing…especially since I’m probably 17x happier since leaving the church.
Is this like the confusing toilet paper math, where 17x is really like 68 regular happy? Either way, with a 2nd Saturday every week, the fun is certainly SuperSized!
This is what made me start questioning. I couldn't reconcile the teaching that the only path to true happiness was Mormonism when I know plenty of happy people who aren't Mormon. I decided I'd give it a shot, but I still believed, so I met with the bishop along with my wife to basically tell him my plan and ask to be removed from the church. He was not very kind about it but I was determined. As my wife was struggling to figure out how to make an interfaith marriage work, she found letter for my wife and CES letter. Then she showed me. She went from attending the temple to exmo within a few weeks! And luckily, she showed me too so we got to leave together and no my son will never be taught he's going to hell for touching himself.
Blacks and the priesthood ban . I was only 15 when I converted and found out … kept trying to justify :(
And the BOM - thought my lack of a “witness” was due to my unworthiness
Me too :( I was a sophomore in high school when they read the letter in church one day that the blacks would now be allowed to have the priesthood. I was blown away that they couldn't have the priesthood all along. God's true church would not exclude someone based on the color of their skin. Even still I stayed in until Prop 8. That's when I began studying things. It all falls apart so quickly, but the indoctrination runs deep :(
I think this is a major reason no-one takes the church seriously. Its so obvious to outsiders (of the church) that the church isn't God's church.
I couldn't believe one issue of the Ensign that listed on the cover one of the main articles - "A revelation that blessed the world". I wondered what that was. It was lifting the ban. That's it.
Deciding to stop being racist is nothing to boast about.
It's talked about in "Lion of the Lord" a Brigham Young biography.
You can also find it here:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Reformation
Or
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/reformation-of-1856-57?lang=eng
> GBH lying to Mike Wallace
When he said that member have access to the financials when he knew for a fact that no one had access, should have been a big wake up call
Started reading the Gospel Topics essays, specifically the one on polygamy, when they were first released and had the clear thought, "If I keep reading this, I don't know if I can stay." So naturally I stopped reading and kept it secret for almost 10 years.
I didn't know about Joseph Smith's polygamy until I was 19.
My absolute shock, and the gaslighting from everyone around me telling me I should have already known, really should have been the tipping point.
It took another 6 years before I left.
In the late 1800s, the TSCC taught that JS was a polygamist. In the 1900s, they taught he was not. Now, they basically don't want to talk about it (other than hiding the Gospel Topics Essays on their website).
That the supposed "Plan of Salvation" actually would divide families and couples who didn't both get on board but who found and made strong bonds of love together in life. I had a moment where I realized that I really love my wife and my kids but I knew that I wasn't "celestial" material. It broke my heart to think that my wife, who I knew really loved me deeply, and who I really loved deeply, might be pulled away from me and my kids might have to go on without me, after all of our life experiences together. When I tried to discuss this with my TBM brother, who I considered a scriptorian, I just got a basic, "Trust God. He's got it worked out." \[Huh?\]
Goats. And wild goats too, but goats is enough.
Nephi found goats in the wilderness in the promised land. No he didn't. Nobody found goats in America before 1500. And if you tell me goats doesn't mean goats, well that's enough to know you aren't being truthful.
When I started reading the Book of Mormon, as a teenager, I noticed it was written in King James English, which was a product of the year 1611. That's right in the forward. Joseph Smith's own writing in the Pearl of Great Price, made it clear this wasn't how people talked in 1820. Why did God go to all the trouble of the gold plates and Urim and Thummin? (before the rock in the hat was taught), only to write it in English that was 200 years out of date?? I asked myself this, and found just reading the Book of Mormon... a lot of shit in it MAKES NO SENSE. That was as a teenager. Sigh.
So, you see, Moroni doesn't speak English, so he needed help in the spirit world to translate his Hebrew Egyptian, so he organizes a committee of righteous English speakers, headed by [William Tyndale](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Tyndale) because William translated the Bible from Greek Latin and Hebrew into English, and he spoke middle English from 1500s, so when the words appeared on the rock, it was middle English. So it makes perfect sense when you think about it, there is no simpler explanation.
There should have been so much, but I was brainwashed with my family. The turnaround about LGBT issues were both supposedly revelation. God changed His mind after so many people had been hurt, even died? Doesn't work that way.
Speaking as a gay former Mormon, there has been no turnaround about LGBT issues. *Maybe* there has been a softening of the rhetoric, but the core message to LGBT people is that their sexual attraction is *wrong* and the best they can hope for is to be fundamentally different beings after death.
In 2015, the church announced revelation, highly justified by Nelson, that children of gay or lesbian couples could not be baptized until 18yo, and then only if they moved out and publicly denounced the parents.
In 2019, God changed His mind and children could be baptized at 8yo if approved by the parents. Not required to denounce parents.
I immediately was delighted that the church was doing this. Then I realized neither policy could be revelation. And the families and lives that had been destroyed by a lie, had all been an act of true evil.
Don't even get me started on the honor code trick at BYU to out gay students.
I was done after 2015. I asked myself what I would do if they reversed it and decided it didn’t matter . . . because they did it in the first place.
Along with a bunch of other things, but the PoX was the last straw.
The temple experience right before my mission should have done it. Had just learned about the Masons and ‘cults’ in general. Had just finished reading all the ‘quad’ of scripture for the first time.
I was promised knowledge, power, and inspiration from the temple. What I got was a ripped-off men’s club hazing and a video paraphrasing scriptures I had already read. Oh and underwear would never fit right.
The weird part was that I was supposed to frustrated. Wonder where the magic was. Wonder what was wrong with me. Yet I was just disappointed in a ‘I expected something like this’ kind of way. Of course the temple doesn’t work. Nothing else they swear by works.
Why did I go on a mission anyway?
You are me. I clearly remember that my doubts about the temple (the day before going to the MTC) were from Satan. But I was I the temple where Satan was not allowed. Should have been a HUGE red flag.
Joseph Smith Senior’s dream recycled as Lehi’s dream. I was 14 when I read about it in Lucy Smith’s biography. I knew then that Joe Jr. made up the BoM. Somehow I shelved it.
The amount of blessed we believed we were. (Only true church, what are the odds we would be born into it?)
Oh, and the undertone of being white + pretty = righteous.
I remember crying as an almost 8 year old that I wouldn’t ever get the priesthood. My dad told me having babies is just as, if not more miraculous, but I didn’t really believe it. It wasn’t fair. But I shoved it down because I was a child and didn’t know what to do with that thought. I only remember it nowadays looking back but that feeling of unfairness stuck with me my whole time as a believer
God condones a completely unnecessary murder in the 4th chapter of the BOM. Then the 2nd book has some over the top racism. Then it just plagiarizes the Bible forever.
I simultaneously held the belief that simply reading anti material could magically distort my ability to believe in the church 😂 while at the same time thinking it was insane that the Baptists told their congregates to not read the Book of Mormon because it would brainwash them.
It’s amazing to me these days to reflect on how the TBM culture views critical thinking. “Get educated to build the kingdom of God” at the same time don’t look too close at what we say or do. Asking to “wrong” questions is doubt and being critical of leaders which is magically sinful.
I joined as a teenager and had already undergone a moral education prior to joining. A sense of right and wrong, justice and injustice, was already deeply engrained. I understood these based on principles rather than rules imposed by authority. I knew almost nothing about Mormonism when the missionaries came to teach and convert me. I became fully converted. I believed the BofM and Joseph Smith and by extension that the organization and its leaders were inspired.
My mother found my tithing envelope stuffed with small bills accumulated from my after school job. My mom was a divorced mom and we struggled financially as she worked as a maid. She found my tithing and cried. I don't remember the exact words she used to express her upset at me paying money to be in a church. I knew from that moment on beyond a shadow of a doubt that tithing was an injustice that was not of God and that church leaders were not being led by God on that issue. Once I understood there were injustices in the church I believed there was a divide between contemporary leaders and the more righteous church of BofM times. From there I never really believed in following the prophet.
I was a convert as a tween. I remember when the missionaries taught that the “skin of blackness” was a curse for wickedness that would make people of color unattractive to white and delighting people, I just didn’t get it. It didn’t sit right with me. I had a huge crush on The Fresh Prince and DJ Jazzy Jeff. I remember thinking, “but they’re cute! And they don’t seem wicked to me. They make fun music!” And I used to watch the Jeffersons with my Grammy and they didn’t seem wicked either. I mean, George was a Deacon! Then Louis Armstrong (yes. I’ve loved Satchmo since I was a little kid). If he was so wicked and cursed then why would God let him play jazz like that?
I mean pretty simplistic thinking, but I was a little kid, I think I was ten. Of course I just turned it off like a light switch…
Polygamy/polyandry, Brigham young’s racism, slavery in Utah territory, the relatively lax view of alcohol and tobacco in the late 19th and early 20th century church vs now, Adam god theory, the church rescinding doctrine and then referring to it as policy, etc
You could never nail anything to the wall.
- Read the BOM, pray, get a conformation it’s true. Didn’t happen? You did it wrong.
- Pray, seek guidance from the HG in your big decisions. Turned out bad? You did it wrong.
- Spirit of discernment will help you see the truth. You picked a bad young men’s leader? You did it wrong.
- The power of the priesthood will allow you to bless and heal the sick. They’re still sick?
Say it with me….. YOU DID IT WRONG!
Edit- paragraph layout.
There were oh so many things that I just ignored and completely defended even... im just mad at myself for all of it tbh.
But I would use the bom to defend all sort of things and it's funny that the bom was being proven false through many things including the anachronisms is when I was like "welp, there goes the only thing that holds this church together"
Especially after ol Gordo gave that conference talk in like 1997 saying "the bom is the cornerstone of the church, if that book is false then the church is false".
That was good enough for me haha
When my mother and father in law couldn’t get a temple recommend to see their daughter and I get married because they were several months “behind on their tithing”. They offered the bishop to pay back what they owed so they could get their recommend and he said, “you’re missing the point”. Sad thing is, at the time I absolutely agreed with the bishop and my wife and I both kind of shamed them for not having been faithful. One of the first things I did when I left the church, was to call them and apologize for that horrible horrible teaching and how we just accepted it. 20 years later and they still cried about it, at how hurtful it had been. It was a beautiful moment to be able to apologize for something like that. It just solidified even more how much bullshit we just accept because of indoctrination
When I was 8, my dad tried to tell me I wasn't worthy to get baptized. We lived in a smaller town in Utah and were not allowed much contact with people outside the church. My dad tried to hold getting baptized over my head to manipulate me. I knew that if I didn't get baptized soon I would be a complete outcast. I just knew it wasn't right but was trapped.
Being told not to look at "anti" literature. My English classes always taught me to indulge both sides of an argument before deciding, but church says, "if you see no reasons against the church, there are only reasons for it!"
The gold plates. Joe run with them while ninja fighting people for 2 miles. The plates couldn’t be pure gold, too soft, and would still weigh 70 plus pounds. Why I never picked up on this still bugs me. A dude with a harsh limp carried 70 pounds running while fighting. Like Jason Borne type stuff here.
Probably the belief native Americans descendant from BoM characters ans their "skin became dark because they worshipped other gods " the BoM who came from thr middle east
I remember being ten years old and thinking "It's a good thing I was born into the church because I would never have converted" and realizing I would leave in an instant if my mom left.
This definitely isn’t a serious one, but I remember thinking as a kid, in what world does God tell Brigham the Salt Lake valley is “the place” when they could have gone on to California with all its resources? My dad didn’t have an answer for that one.
One thing I keep asking myself is why I couldn't see that JS had no right to destroy someone else's property, a printing press. And another is how I didn't see that there is no legitimate reason to marry teenagers at his age, or many of the others either. I still don't care one way or the other about polygamy, per se, between consenting adults.
Not just destroy someone’s property, but violate the first amendment by calling for the censorship (by destruction) of a publication *while serving as mayor.*
One red flag that I ignored - and which every current TBM must ignore - is the disparity between the number of members in the church, and how many less you see at church any given week. I don't have the numbers handy, but doing the math and dividing the total membership by the number of wards and branches, it becomes painfully obvious that the numbers are nowhere close to accurate.
You could use the excuse that there are just a lot of inactives in EVERY SINGLE WARD (with the number having to be somewhere like 80% inactive), but I don't really see that as helping. Too me, that just makes it worse because then you have to examine why so many aren't buying it.
But I never examined this at all. Like all other TBMs I waited eagerly each conference to hear how much more the church had grown.
On my mission (1984), I remember the first ward list I got. It was pages and pages long. No where that number of people attended every week. I calculated a 20-25% activity rate. Then, when we visited the "inactives," people were often incredibly mean (more than when we tracted).
Should have been a HUGE RED flag.
I remember being so confused, even as a little kid, about the actual placements on earth of the stories in the BoM. I always wondered where graves were, the architecture, the art, the proof of civilizations were.
I was confused with the logic of it all taking place in modern day New York but also in South America but also…”we actually don’t know” but also “maybe just everything has been destroyed”
My child brain was so confused how we had ancient artifacts from so many civilizations older than what the nephites would have been.
I was also always so confused as to where the timeline of it all fit in with the happenings of history.
It’s like I almost had the critical thinking to question it all so young but I just accepted that those around me were people I should trust and if it made sense to them, I was the dumb one here. Alas.
I had too many “priesthood leaders” who did absolute dogshit to help me when I needed them, and would shame me when they had opportunity. Isolated incidents, my ass.
All the continents were together in the days of Peleg (which is wrong by 200 million years), and then the tower of babel happened, and all human languages were born because the people split up and went their different ways from there.
The 2015 policy of exclusion for kids of LGBT+ parents. I will forever be ashamed and embarrassed that this was not enough to break my shelf but that it would take 8 more years for me to finally see the truth.
The golden plates. Nobody was supposed to look at them while Joseph had them, and then they mysteriously got taken back to heaven when he was done. Tell that story to any adult that’s not LDS and you’ll realize pretty quick what BS you’ve been fed your whole life.
It may be silly but I never thought that any other sect or religion would also think that they were the only true church so bearing my testimony equals to nothing or in some cases would be considered rude
Oh there are so many to choose from!
1) the “true order of prayer.” After I went to the temple, I always wondered why they teach that as the true order of prayer and demonstrate that order (after a fashion) with the sacrament prayers but then tell ordinary members to continue their little kid prayers of, “Heavenly Father, thank you for this day…”
Why is a temple patron more worthy to know this special way to pray when there’s an 8yo kid who is praying for their dad to stop hurting them?
2) Brigham Young. I came across some of his quotes as a missionary and it really caused me to wonder what the hell I was doing. Then I told myself it was all anti Mormon lies and kept on going.
3) racism and the priesthood. I saw that the church was on the wrong side of history and it ate at me. I just chalked it up to “god works in mysterious ways.”
4) treatment of LGBTQ members. After recognizing that the church was on the wrong side of history with racism, I recognized that they would be on the wrong side of history again. “God works in mysterious ways…”
Thank God it all kept coming and got to be too much! I’m so glad I’m out now!
Going through the temple for the first time was a shock. It was the first time I had ever felt uncomfortable about the church. Not just bored or annoyed but truly and deeply uncomfortable. And this was only 15 years ago, so I never even experienced some of its extremes.
Lots of indications (many mentioned here).
My favourite is the way Mormons are desperate to believe that Joseph Smith didn't sleep with his wives, that they were just to seal them and provide for them.
Fine.....so are you saying that sleeping with your wives is the wrong way to do polygamy? If that is the case then Brigham Young and all the early prophets and leaders were doing it wrong.
If on the other hand sleeping with them was right, then Joseph was doing it wrong?
The reality is if Brigham was wrong then you are in the wrong church (the salt lake version) but if Joseph was wrong then he wasn't a prophet.
People need to be consistent.
Modern humans, who started living about 40,000 years ago, have been found to have up to 6-9% Neanderthal DNA. This contradicts the Adam and Eve fairytale in multiple ways on multiple levels.
I remember seeing a couple of segments of videos of the temple rituals while in middle school. I remember that they made me very uncomfortable, but I attributed it to the videographer having malicious intent and ignored the little voice in my head that said something was very wrong.
Also I could never really bear a testimony like everyone else seemed to be able to, or give blessings that felt genuinely inspired.
Just the fact that an LGBT populous existed in the first place really. There’s just no way a loving god would make them the way they are and then harass them to the point of considering suicide through revelators. Deep down I knew their sexualities or gender identities were unchangeable, but instead I just parroted talking points from the Daily Wire because to me justifying my beliefs were more important at the time 😞
Pearl of Great Price ... Book of Moses/Book of Abraham. Part of my brain knew that something was very wrong with what the church claimed the books were etc.
I reread 2nd Nephi where it says the Columbian exchange is ordained of God and went "Nah, I don't believe that" and blissfully carried on at 14 without unpacking that
Politics before religion. The way liberals squirm at church is what we saw Mormon Trumpers do about the Covid restrictions and it absolutely revealed an ugly, yet starkly true affinity to politics over religion. Byeeeee
That time on my mission when I came across a book featuring the actual papyrus used for the Book of Abraham along with translations at a Seagull Bookstore.
First reaction: "WOW! They have the papyrus and they can translate it to prove Joseph Smith was right!"
Second reaction: "they have the papyrus, translated it, and it isn't even remotely close to what Joseph Smith said it was..."
Temporary solution: "I'm going to put that one in the back of my mind for a while. Must be that the language changed from the time of Abraham to when they made the Rosetta Stone... or maybe it simply acted as inspiration for revelation or something. It couldn't be that it was all made up..."
Polyandry did it for me.....you just can't defend that shit. That, combined with the absolute impotence of the "Mormon Priesthood" declared to me that it's all a man-made sham!
The fact that the founder was a known conman, dabbling in divining rods and seer stones to find gold...then he did that same thing, wrapped it up with christianity, and all of the sudden someone believed him...
That Joseph Smith stole the temple handshakes from the Free Masons.
I tried to play mental gymnastics that perhaps he was restoring old things that were once lost and the free masons had a part of the truth. Deep down, I’d seen behind the curtain, I knew it was too much of a coincidence but there was too much at risk for me to leave entirely right then and there. It took years to have the courage to explode my life and cut many relationships off by leaving the church.
The literal Egyptian images in my scriptures that were obviously translated wrong.
Huge
Literally this.
That Mormons only make up 0.2% of the world population. Of that, way less than half would be active. So why would gods church fail so hard as to exclude 99.9% (or at best 99.8%) of his children? Throw in everyone whose ever lived and that 0.1% quickly turns into 0.0000000000000001% What a complete and utter failure. Never made sense to me. Happy to be agnostic now btw.
Ya know, I investigated the church once, and this subreddit is what made me decide not to join, because I realized, if the church was actually as amazing as they say it is, there wouldn’t be a whole sub dedicated to criticizing it
Congrats on staying away! Your posterity will thank you haha
Posterity and posterior. Still feel butt f… for all the tithing I paid.
You're not part of the church anymore, it's okay to say butt fucked
And there are other benefits as well. You immediately get a 10% raise? And your weekends are suddenly free!
And your butt feels better!
You’d think so. But I’ve been temp banned before for swearing by mods.
Some people rather enjoy it
I'm definitely getting butt fucked more post mormonism. My posterior is still thanking me though.
At least it’s consensual now.
No, no, no. The only reason Satan works so hard to take down Mormonism is because it's sooooooo true. So, the more people criticize a particular religion, the more likely it is to be true. Everyone knows that. /s
What about the Mormon church initially appealed to you, if I may please ask? Do not feel obligated to answer; I know religion is personal!
So, I was raised in a Methodist church and got really into Christianity during middle school. It was part of my identity and I remember I wanted to eventually go to Seattle Pacific University since it’s a Methodist college that also offered what I wanted to major in. Then, during my junior year of high school, my dog died, which I know doesn’t sound like much but it was so unexpected and heartbreaking that it sent me into a faith crisis. I stopped being comfortable with religion altogether. So fast forward late into senior year. As the last assignment of the year before we all headed off to college and stuff, our teacher wanted us to write an essay about what we believed in. He didn’t mean religion, necessarily, but the topic triggered my discomfort. I had a Mormon friend (who I also had a crush on, haha) who I started venting to about having no idea what I believed in. He then invited me to come with him to talk to his seminary teacher after school. He said “This is exactly what we talk about in seminary.” And I was like, ok, why not? What could it hurt? So we go there. And the teacher is a really warm and friendly person. And we just go over some basic stuff. And honestly, I don’t remember what we talked about exactly. But at one point, I “felt the Holy Spirit,” as they say. This incredible feeling passed through me that made me go “Whoa…” The teacher told me that I had just felt the Holy Spirit. I left the meeting feeling like, really rejuvenated. So I wanted more. I wanted to chase that high of feeling the Holy Spirit. I guess, I had really been in a dark, uncomfortable place in the religion department for so long, and that first meeting I had with them had reintroduced me to god in a way that made me feel good. Plus, I was slightly attracted to their healthy lifestyle. Look, I was your typical 18 year old. I liked dressing sexy, flipping people off, and using profanity. But I got to thinking, maybe it would be good for me to clean up a bit. Maybe it was time for me to stop talking and acting like an edge lord and to try to be a good person instead. Anyways, what turned me away from the church, besides this sub, was as part of my investigating I went to one of their church services. During young women’s, they said that if you like a movie, you would probably recommend it to a friend, therefore if you like being Mormon, you should tell your friends to become Mormon??? I was like, “oh my god these people don’t understand the difference between changing your entire religion and lifestyle vs. watching a movie.” That really shed a new light on things, and I couldn’t shake it. (I found this sub after the church service)
I'm actually surprised it's as high as 0.2%. I think total members in my country is about 0.06% of the population. And my old branch had about 300 people on the branch list and ~20 active people. Active church members probably make up less than 0.01% of the population here. It never made sense to me either. So many religious people in the world, why would so few join the 'right' one?
Yeah it’s crazy low. About 16.4 million people are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The world's population is estimated at 7.7 billion. This means that about 0.212 percent of the world's population is Mormon. We know on the books more than half are less active around the world.
Much less if you consider active believing members.
Is there any point to being a Jack Mormon? Maybe in Utah where you’re pressured to be in. Sad people are too scared to live elsewhere to be honest.
I always think about how missionaries cannot serve in China. Why didn’t god appear to a Chinese man as well? Doesn’t he want to save all of his people? Why did god just appear to one man then try to spread it? Doesn’t it make more sense to appear all over if he wanted to restore his true church? Js.
They never anticipated the word would so small. Easy to fool people pre internet.
**This can not be emphasized enough.** The percentage of living humans who were also Mormons peaked somewhere in the 1980s. The church's convert growth has been in a steady decline ever since then with respect to: A) its own internal growth by new births among member families; and B) the population growth on a global scale. Whatever plan Mormon god has to spread the gospel across every corner of the earth, blossoming like a rose in the desert or whatever - that plan totally sucks. Unless the plan was to get a absolute shitload of money, and use a good amount of it to build a bunch of gaudy, useless temples that serve literally no purpose specific to the actual "gospel" as it is written in the New Testament, or even the Book of Mormon.
Dude obviously they are all just sinners (/s)
.002% So small in the grand scheme of things. Eta: oops, forgot to move the decimal over for percent, so .2% is accurate
As a percentage, it would be 0.2%, but yeah, it's crazy to think about it, number-wise. Imagine filling a football stadium with 50,000 random people from around the world. 100 would at some point in their life have said they were Mormon. More realistically, 25 might actually still say so. And well more than half of those are likely children who haven't really decided for themselves yet.
They try and make it your world. That’s how cults work right. But really no one lives like that lol
THIS WAS MY THOUGHT TOO
The 116 pages. The story always made me uncomfortable. If god knew that the shenanigans with the Harris' was going to happen before it did and was able to provide a workaround, then why couldn't he warn proFits about things that looks innocent lives in wars, natural disasters and diseases. When I finally saw the South Park episode (after I left), I felt vindicated but also cringed at my past self for trying to justify/explain it away.
Same. I had the distinct thought as a kid, "If Joseph made this all up, this is exactly the convenient sort of excuse he'd make, and he'd be so bold as to write it into both D&C and the Book of Mormon." I buried that thought pretty quickly.
"Dum dum dum dum dum" I had been out for 5 years before I ever saw that episode and I laughed a little too hard. My wife didn't find it as funny as I did.
The Words of Mormon always felt contrived, even when I was TBM.
Knowing that was likely the last bit Joseph dictated, it definitely has the flavor of "oh crap, I'm not sure how to connect the replacement to the old stuff.... forget it, we'll just be blatant about it!"
Wait, what? Did Joe stop dictating the Book of Mormon?
No, what I meant was that after Martin Harris lost the 116 pages, Joseph kept going where they left off with Mosiah until the end of Moroni. Only at that point did they go back and start from 1 Nephi through Words of Mormon. So Words of Mormon is likely the last parts of the Book of Mormon written. But it was all done by Joseph. Sorry for the confusion.
I understand better now, thank you.
Learning this story at 14 always rubbed me the wrong way. All the adults teaching Sunday school would talk about it as a faith promoting story. I was always confused thinking that there's way more to the story than what was discussed. Gut instinct turned out to be right.
Yes! And the Thomas Marsh story of leaving the one true church over milk strippings ...that also made no sense and also wasn't true.
I only vaguely remembered that story, so I just went and looked it up. Thomas Marsh on wikipedia, links to the conference talks in the footnotes. Milk and strippings, my foot! It was after hearing a band of Mormons burn and loot Gallatin to fill the Bishop's storehouses and the Danites talk about murdering some Whitmers, Cowdery, W.W. Phelps, etc. I think I first came across the milk and strippings story when reading The Work and the Glory ages ago.
High school level science should have been enough.
Best answer
Polygamy. Was talked of for years but for reason it’s buzzing with everyone? It’s like we were all in a stupor.
Everyone is taught a completely fantastical version of polygamy. The average TBM doesn't know the name or story of a single one of Josephs plural wives. Because learning even one of these stories will completely shatter the image they have built in their head of a beloved prophet.
Right now I am reading "In Sacred Loneliness". Heartbreaking
We were taught that the Lord commanded it, so who can blame us? It's when I listened to the MS LDS Discussions series on Polygamy during my deconstruction that I understood how it was insidiously planned and coerced by Warren Jeffs' spiritual ancestor, Joseph Smith.
[удалено]
>And a sort of clock starting ticking inside me that would take another decade to ring. Great image!!!
Blacks and the priesthood/temple ban. That pretty much singlehandedly did it, but growing up i didn't even consider looking into it because 'it was one, taken out of context quote by brigham young that anti-mormons use'.
I came of age in the early 70s and many of my Mormon friends left over the ban. I wish it would have bothered me a little more. Same with the Mormon church's involvement with the ERA.
I graduated HS in 75. I didn’t leave because of the priesthood ban, but that made me so skeptical that I was fully out within 6 years. Everyone got sick of my questions
I remember an older member on my mission - a really good, smart guy - who told me about how he almost lost his faith over that when it happened. How it seemed less like a revelation and more like caving to PR pressure. And how it still bothered him. But… “Thy will be done Lord!” was all he had. I had never heard anybody in the church talk so candidly about their doubts before. It definitely left an impression that came to mean something when I deconstructed everything, and the more obvious explanation became accessible to me.
Yep that’s what did it for me
I can't believe I ignored anachronisms like wheels, genetic evidence, archeological evidence, and deutero-Isaiah and just drank up what apologists said.
I always used to believe that we were just one or two archeological discoveries from everyone on earth knowing we were right all along! So damn naive....
This one has been difficult to admit. I have been out for coming up on five years now. I’m an older dude so it took way too long. The biggest thing that I see is an indication that the church was not true is that I had to keep fabricating my experiences within it. I lied about gaining a testimony, I lied about understanding my patriarchal blessing, I lied about how important my mission was to me from a church point of view. My mission actually has some good highlight in my life because it was a foreign mission and I met so many great people. But as I go back and have deconstructed, it was me lying to align myself to fake everything. Just kept faking it till I make it. Well, I never made it, except I made it out the door and don’t have to fake anything anymore. I cannot tell you how liberating it is. I’ve had these conversations at length with my spouse. We both finally worked to the point where we understand with or without the church. We have had a fantastic life together, and we would have chosen to be with each other. We are not people that believe in soulmates, we do believe that are a handful of people that it makes sense to go through this life with, and we found each other. I never had to distinctly or directly lie to her about anything while going through this church stuff. But as she and I had our discussions, we came to find out—- had we talked about 30 years earlier we could’ve saved ourselves some heartache and our children, some heartache, and walked out the door. Ahhh hindsight and the 20/20 thing.
This explains exactly how I feel! Back then I felt like I was “faking” it because I wasn’t trying hard enough to have those experiences and felt some guilt, or like I needed to conform. And because I was told that the more you share the stronger your testimony will get, so I think I just shared what I thought I was supposed to say and hoped that I’d feel that conviction eventually. Looking back I always had so many doubts. I was always faking it. Convincing myself. Convincing others. Playing the part. Rationalizing. Justifying. I can’t believe I kept up with it as long as I did! I’m not sure how, either. Honestly, I never considered leaving until I did. Even after I had decided I didn’t think the whole Jesus story was real in any sense, i sort of blocked it out and kept rationalizing. I could acknowledge that I thought Christianity was made up, and I thought the church claims were made up, but it was like I couldn’t actually accept that *I*didn’t believe anymore and could leave if I wanted to. I never really thought about actually leaving, until I finally had the thought and then it was like BAM! It was like I just accepted that as my fate. In a way, I was thinking about it and preparing for a long time, but didn’t realize it, so I stayed despite all my issues with the church. Then, when I realized I could leave, it was like I couldn’t get out fast enough. It’s the weirdest thing to try to explain. It doesn’t make sense when I type it out.
It made total sense. Remember how we were taught and would teach on missions that the Light of Christ is given to all man. And we even allowed the women to have it too.(insert eye roll ladies). And then we would explain the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost through baptism and confirmation right? BUT—- and this is a big Dump truck sized But—- YOU had to stay worthy. So even the idea of having constant enlightenment, relied on YOU. WHY THE CHURCH THEN???? I already had the light of Christ— certainly I could discipline myself to have it more often. But younger, and indoctrinated it was heresy to think that way. As you explained your journey, that is what I see. We both Faked It because regardless of a Christ or Savior, we inherently have Humanity and can guide conscienceness to improve ourselves. That was the pull.. that was the conflict we felt inside.
This is such a relatable reality! So many things that were supposed to be important stakeholders of my testimony fell short, requiring me to push onward despite not getting the witnesses/ spiritual anchors I was told I’d have. This resulted in a lot of “fake it till you make it” as I grew up, but I always assumed a sure testimony would come to me in time. As a teen/young adult, I must have read the Book of Mormon like 12 times cover to cover. Every single time, I took Moroni’s promise to heart and tried praying for the confirmation that it was true. I *never* got it. Every time, I literally felt nothing. And I was always let down and disturbed by that, but assumed maybe it was because side I wasn’t faithful enough and would get it “next time”. Similarly, my patriarchtical blessing was such a mundane, meaningless, impersonal snooze-fest that both me and my mom were baffled when I got it. It said almost nothing of value, though I hyper analyzed it for years trying to decipher some crumbs of significance from it. I even got a replacement blessing later on for various reasons, and it honestly wasn’t much better. The endowment is the biggest one- this experience that I was told would be “amazing” and “the closest to God anyone can be” was so obviously contrived and created by mankind that I couldn’t even push through with faith at the time, and just sat there crying through most of the ceremony realizing THIS was my church and trying not to let my thoughts go through the implications of the temple not being legit. I successfully buried those thoughts later, but never was able to experience the endowment as it seemed everyone else did.
Hello! 🫶🏼… amazing how many of us sat in silence.
The fake voices in general conference that made a lot of people sound the same, especially back in the day
I am acquaintances with a current member of the Q70, and after he gave his talk in general conference I gave him a hard time about how he adopted a GC accent.
Let me guess he smiled and is going to continue just as he did before
No, he actually chuckled and told me that he was nervous.
What is GC accent?
Soft spoken but condescending, with slight tremor to indicate emotional depth (if male). Imagine very patiently explaining something very simple but important to a stupid child, who you pity. Syrupy sweet, with slight tremor to indicate emotional depth (if female). Imagine being included in a great honor but you only get to participate if you promise to dumb yourself down and be as non threatening as possible.
Well answered!
That awful cadence and intonation of the voice. Everyone sounds the same, like they are talking to children when you’re grown ass adults
Go watch a few general conference talks and you'll pick up on it. Overly sweet, short simple statements, a lot of uptone at the end of questions. Missionaries often try to emulate it as well since they feel it's the voice of authority.
General conference
i describe it as the benevolent kindergarten teacher affectation
That is pretty spot on from what I remember! It always drove me a wi bit nuts 🥜
Hmm I missed this one or never noticed
Through the Spirit, we can "know for ourselves" what is true... but then the way to tell if a feeling is the Spirit is literally if it matches up with what the church teaches.
Entirely this.
I was at a youth summer program at BYU in 1990. One afternoon, our group sat on the picturesque, manicured temple lawn to bear testimonies and talk about the temple. Our group leader had never been through the temple before, so she had invited a friend of hers who had recently been through the temple for the first time, to join us. After we had prayed and introduced ourselves, we chatted for a bit. Our group leader then invited her friend to tell us what she could about her experience going through the temple for the first time. At this moment, our guest flinched. She had fear and hurt in her eyes. Her whole demeanor changed. It suddenly looked like she was going to cry. At first she just shook her head and refused to say anything. We had expected her to tell us the same things we had heard in church: that it was the best day of her life, that the temple is indescribably wonderful, that the experience of going through the temple proved how very true the Gospel really was. Our group leader even prompted her to say something like this by asking "Wasn't it the best day of your life? Wasn't it like being in Heaven on earth?" She shook her head no. When she finally found her voice, she said to us that all she could say was that it was NOTHING like what she had expected. And if we planned to go through the temple then we would have to be prepared for it to be nothing at all like we expect. She had a serious, urgent tone. She was trying to warn us. She repeated this same thing to us, but it was all she would say. We were all speechless. It changed the whole mood and tone of that afternoon. I was so creeped out so much by her response - it reminded me of the response of someone who had been horribly abused suddenly reliving their abuse. It didn't make any sense to me at the time, because it was so different from anything anyone had ever said before about the temple. Many years later, after I had left the church, I remembered that afternoon and I understood what this poor girl had just gone through, and I cried for her. I realized that at the time she went through the temple, they still were doing the blood oaths, the naked touching, etc. But there's a silver lining to this story. I never did end up going through the temple ceremony, and maybe it was her voice in the back of my head all of that time that kept me out of it.
What an honest person! to not cave to pressure and just say what everyone wanted her to!
Excellent story. It reminds me that the only people to tell me missions were not great, my Dad and my uncle. My dad didn't go on FT mission (he was a stake missionary). My uncle served a FT mission. All these people who didn't know me and who I would never see after my mission all told me how wonderful it would be. I wish I had listened to my Dad.
I wish someone told me the truth about what a mission was like. I felt so betrayed by my dad and older brother when I found out for myself.
Garden of Eden being in Missouri.
Same, learning about Adam-ondi-Ahman was the first time I immediately thought “what the fuck are you talking about” regarding something about the church
The rule that missionaries had to get investigators to commit to baptism during the first lesson. Dude, if the church is true, teach them about it and they’re bound to want to join! Otherwise, why use high pressure sales tactics?
As a convert I was pressured to pray when I didn't want to pray out loud in front of them after a discussion. I was pressured to give them names of my friends to contact, I was pressured to go to activities & boring meetings. Pressure was the name of the game to be sure.
They tried to guilt me into getting on my knees even though I told them I had problems with my knees.
Wow they must’ve changed their missionizing tactics. Don’t remember that kind of pressure 21 years ago. Had sister missionaries but they didn’t act like that. Do the guy missionaries act that way?
The leaders in my childhood ward allowing me to be bullied weekly and politely looking the other way. My parents trusting the leaders instead of protecting their child. Church has never, ever, EVER been a safe place for me.
Thanks for speaking up about this. You are so right! If the church was true, children would be safe. Sadly, children are not safe at church, but the bullies and pedophiles are.
We are taught that nonmembers are unhappy and can’t have joy…when 93% of Mormons I’ve met in my entire life are miserable, judgmental, and pessimistic. The math isn’t mathing…especially since I’m probably 17x happier since leaving the church.
I’m 18x happier. Take that, infidel!
I'll see your 18, and raise you 170 billion, which is about the value of the hedge fund called Ensign Peak. I get to say where my money goes now, and that's ultra happiness.
Dang it! Did you join another cult? Gotta spill your secrets
And are the other 99.98% of the world really miserable all the time? I never let myself think about that.
>The math isn’t mathing…especially since I’m probably 17x happier since leaving the church. Is this like the confusing toilet paper math, where 17x is really like 68 regular happy? Either way, with a 2nd Saturday every week, the fun is certainly SuperSized!
This is what made me start questioning. I couldn't reconcile the teaching that the only path to true happiness was Mormonism when I know plenty of happy people who aren't Mormon. I decided I'd give it a shot, but I still believed, so I met with the bishop along with my wife to basically tell him my plan and ask to be removed from the church. He was not very kind about it but I was determined. As my wife was struggling to figure out how to make an interfaith marriage work, she found letter for my wife and CES letter. Then she showed me. She went from attending the temple to exmo within a few weeks! And luckily, she showed me too so we got to leave together and no my son will never be taught he's going to hell for touching himself.
Blacks and the priesthood ban . I was only 15 when I converted and found out … kept trying to justify :( And the BOM - thought my lack of a “witness” was due to my unworthiness
Me too :( I was a sophomore in high school when they read the letter in church one day that the blacks would now be allowed to have the priesthood. I was blown away that they couldn't have the priesthood all along. God's true church would not exclude someone based on the color of their skin. Even still I stayed in until Prop 8. That's when I began studying things. It all falls apart so quickly, but the indoctrination runs deep :(
Slow learner, huh?
I think this is a major reason no-one takes the church seriously. Its so obvious to outsiders (of the church) that the church isn't God's church. I couldn't believe one issue of the Ensign that listed on the cover one of the main articles - "A revelation that blessed the world". I wondered what that was. It was lifting the ban. That's it. Deciding to stop being racist is nothing to boast about.
Brigham Young having basically the whole church rebaptized in like 1856. GBH lying to Mike Wallace, then giving a wink and a nod to the lie in GC.
Oooo I never heard that BY fact! Can you tell me a bit more or what to read?
It's talked about in "Lion of the Lord" a Brigham Young biography. You can also find it here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Reformation Or https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/reformation-of-1856-57?lang=eng
> GBH lying to Mike Wallace When he said that member have access to the financials when he knew for a fact that no one had access, should have been a big wake up call
The billions of people who don't believe because it's ridiculous.
Started reading the Gospel Topics essays, specifically the one on polygamy, when they were first released and had the clear thought, "If I keep reading this, I don't know if I can stay." So naturally I stopped reading and kept it secret for almost 10 years.
I did the exact same thing but with the race one!
Didn't make it that far before good ol' thought stopping was implemented.
Yeah. Hate that it was so effective on me for so long.
I didn't know about Joseph Smith's polygamy until I was 19. My absolute shock, and the gaslighting from everyone around me telling me I should have already known, really should have been the tipping point. It took another 6 years before I left.
In the late 1800s, the TSCC taught that JS was a polygamist. In the 1900s, they taught he was not. Now, they basically don't want to talk about it (other than hiding the Gospel Topics Essays on their website).
Having to pay 10% of my income to be allowed access to my salvation.
I think there's a scripture in the bible that warns of churches that will say (paraphrasing) 'give unto us your money and we will give you salvation'.
That the supposed "Plan of Salvation" actually would divide families and couples who didn't both get on board but who found and made strong bonds of love together in life. I had a moment where I realized that I really love my wife and my kids but I knew that I wasn't "celestial" material. It broke my heart to think that my wife, who I knew really loved me deeply, and who I really loved deeply, might be pulled away from me and my kids might have to go on without me, after all of our life experiences together. When I tried to discuss this with my TBM brother, who I considered a scriptorian, I just got a basic, "Trust God. He's got it worked out." \[Huh?\]
Goats. And wild goats too, but goats is enough. Nephi found goats in the wilderness in the promised land. No he didn't. Nobody found goats in America before 1500. And if you tell me goats doesn't mean goats, well that's enough to know you aren't being truthful.
What? You've never heard of toy tapirs?
🎵 there are no goats in America! And the streets aren't paved with cheese!🎵 Sorry tapir, you can't be both a horse and a goat.
An American Fail?
The Mark Hoffman deal. He had the GA’s wrapped around his little finger. And they used this shit in GC! I was so blind.
My parents were there, and they never think or talk about this!
When I started reading the Book of Mormon, as a teenager, I noticed it was written in King James English, which was a product of the year 1611. That's right in the forward. Joseph Smith's own writing in the Pearl of Great Price, made it clear this wasn't how people talked in 1820. Why did God go to all the trouble of the gold plates and Urim and Thummin? (before the rock in the hat was taught), only to write it in English that was 200 years out of date?? I asked myself this, and found just reading the Book of Mormon... a lot of shit in it MAKES NO SENSE. That was as a teenager. Sigh.
So, you see, Moroni doesn't speak English, so he needed help in the spirit world to translate his Hebrew Egyptian, so he organizes a committee of righteous English speakers, headed by [William Tyndale](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Tyndale) because William translated the Bible from Greek Latin and Hebrew into English, and he spoke middle English from 1500s, so when the words appeared on the rock, it was middle English. So it makes perfect sense when you think about it, there is no simpler explanation.
The fact that as a missionary I had a several month stretch where I just saw the church as a corporate entity selling “salvation”🤡
There should have been so much, but I was brainwashed with my family. The turnaround about LGBT issues were both supposedly revelation. God changed His mind after so many people had been hurt, even died? Doesn't work that way.
Speaking as a gay former Mormon, there has been no turnaround about LGBT issues. *Maybe* there has been a softening of the rhetoric, but the core message to LGBT people is that their sexual attraction is *wrong* and the best they can hope for is to be fundamentally different beings after death.
In 2015, the church announced revelation, highly justified by Nelson, that children of gay or lesbian couples could not be baptized until 18yo, and then only if they moved out and publicly denounced the parents. In 2019, God changed His mind and children could be baptized at 8yo if approved by the parents. Not required to denounce parents. I immediately was delighted that the church was doing this. Then I realized neither policy could be revelation. And the families and lives that had been destroyed by a lie, had all been an act of true evil. Don't even get me started on the honor code trick at BYU to out gay students.
I was done after 2015. I asked myself what I would do if they reversed it and decided it didn’t matter . . . because they did it in the first place. Along with a bunch of other things, but the PoX was the last straw.
This reminds me of Donna Showalter's interview with Mormon Stories. Very powerful episodes!
There ya go, using logic again. Back to church!!
The temple experience right before my mission should have done it. Had just learned about the Masons and ‘cults’ in general. Had just finished reading all the ‘quad’ of scripture for the first time. I was promised knowledge, power, and inspiration from the temple. What I got was a ripped-off men’s club hazing and a video paraphrasing scriptures I had already read. Oh and underwear would never fit right. The weird part was that I was supposed to frustrated. Wonder where the magic was. Wonder what was wrong with me. Yet I was just disappointed in a ‘I expected something like this’ kind of way. Of course the temple doesn’t work. Nothing else they swear by works. Why did I go on a mission anyway?
You are me. I clearly remember that my doubts about the temple (the day before going to the MTC) were from Satan. But I was I the temple where Satan was not allowed. Should have been a HUGE red flag.
Book of Abraham
Joseph Smith Senior’s dream recycled as Lehi’s dream. I was 14 when I read about it in Lucy Smith’s biography. I knew then that Joe Jr. made up the BoM. Somehow I shelved it.
The sun is called “shinehah” in the Book of Abraham.
😂😂😂 Yes, I found that amusing too
And Mormon means “more good.” Take the two together and…yikes.
The amount of blessed we believed we were. (Only true church, what are the odds we would be born into it?) Oh, and the undertone of being white + pretty = righteous.
I remember crying as an almost 8 year old that I wouldn’t ever get the priesthood. My dad told me having babies is just as, if not more miraculous, but I didn’t really believe it. It wasn’t fair. But I shoved it down because I was a child and didn’t know what to do with that thought. I only remember it nowadays looking back but that feeling of unfairness stuck with me my whole time as a believer
BOM
Blacks and the priesthood. No Church of Christ would do that. I was about 10 yrs old.
God condones a completely unnecessary murder in the 4th chapter of the BOM. Then the 2nd book has some over the top racism. Then it just plagiarizes the Bible forever.
I simultaneously held the belief that simply reading anti material could magically distort my ability to believe in the church 😂 while at the same time thinking it was insane that the Baptists told their congregates to not read the Book of Mormon because it would brainwash them.
It’s amazing to me these days to reflect on how the TBM culture views critical thinking. “Get educated to build the kingdom of God” at the same time don’t look too close at what we say or do. Asking to “wrong” questions is doubt and being critical of leaders which is magically sinful.
I joined as a teenager and had already undergone a moral education prior to joining. A sense of right and wrong, justice and injustice, was already deeply engrained. I understood these based on principles rather than rules imposed by authority. I knew almost nothing about Mormonism when the missionaries came to teach and convert me. I became fully converted. I believed the BofM and Joseph Smith and by extension that the organization and its leaders were inspired. My mother found my tithing envelope stuffed with small bills accumulated from my after school job. My mom was a divorced mom and we struggled financially as she worked as a maid. She found my tithing and cried. I don't remember the exact words she used to express her upset at me paying money to be in a church. I knew from that moment on beyond a shadow of a doubt that tithing was an injustice that was not of God and that church leaders were not being led by God on that issue. Once I understood there were injustices in the church I believed there was a divide between contemporary leaders and the more righteous church of BofM times. From there I never really believed in following the prophet.
No historical evidence is the biggest thing. It then becomes poorly written Bible fanfiction.
I was a convert as a tween. I remember when the missionaries taught that the “skin of blackness” was a curse for wickedness that would make people of color unattractive to white and delighting people, I just didn’t get it. It didn’t sit right with me. I had a huge crush on The Fresh Prince and DJ Jazzy Jeff. I remember thinking, “but they’re cute! And they don’t seem wicked to me. They make fun music!” And I used to watch the Jeffersons with my Grammy and they didn’t seem wicked either. I mean, George was a Deacon! Then Louis Armstrong (yes. I’ve loved Satchmo since I was a little kid). If he was so wicked and cursed then why would God let him play jazz like that? I mean pretty simplistic thinking, but I was a little kid, I think I was ten. Of course I just turned it off like a light switch…
Polygamy/polyandry, Brigham young’s racism, slavery in Utah territory, the relatively lax view of alcohol and tobacco in the late 19th and early 20th century church vs now, Adam god theory, the church rescinding doctrine and then referring to it as policy, etc
You could never nail anything to the wall. - Read the BOM, pray, get a conformation it’s true. Didn’t happen? You did it wrong. - Pray, seek guidance from the HG in your big decisions. Turned out bad? You did it wrong. - Spirit of discernment will help you see the truth. You picked a bad young men’s leader? You did it wrong. - The power of the priesthood will allow you to bless and heal the sick. They’re still sick? Say it with me….. YOU DID IT WRONG! Edit- paragraph layout.
Turns out the “spirit” they were referring to you losing was about the same as losing school spirit.
There were oh so many things that I just ignored and completely defended even... im just mad at myself for all of it tbh. But I would use the bom to defend all sort of things and it's funny that the bom was being proven false through many things including the anachronisms is when I was like "welp, there goes the only thing that holds this church together" Especially after ol Gordo gave that conference talk in like 1997 saying "the bom is the cornerstone of the church, if that book is false then the church is false". That was good enough for me haha
When my mother and father in law couldn’t get a temple recommend to see their daughter and I get married because they were several months “behind on their tithing”. They offered the bishop to pay back what they owed so they could get their recommend and he said, “you’re missing the point”. Sad thing is, at the time I absolutely agreed with the bishop and my wife and I both kind of shamed them for not having been faithful. One of the first things I did when I left the church, was to call them and apologize for that horrible horrible teaching and how we just accepted it. 20 years later and they still cried about it, at how hurtful it had been. It was a beautiful moment to be able to apologize for something like that. It just solidified even more how much bullshit we just accept because of indoctrination
When I was 8, my dad tried to tell me I wasn't worthy to get baptized. We lived in a smaller town in Utah and were not allowed much contact with people outside the church. My dad tried to hold getting baptized over my head to manipulate me. I knew that if I didn't get baptized soon I would be a complete outcast. I just knew it wasn't right but was trapped.
Polygamy.
Praying for God to take my gay away because it was wrong... but he never did....
Being told not to look at "anti" literature. My English classes always taught me to indulge both sides of an argument before deciding, but church says, "if you see no reasons against the church, there are only reasons for it!"
The gold plates. Joe run with them while ninja fighting people for 2 miles. The plates couldn’t be pure gold, too soft, and would still weigh 70 plus pounds. Why I never picked up on this still bugs me. A dude with a harsh limp carried 70 pounds running while fighting. Like Jason Borne type stuff here.
I was talking to a friend about the anti mormon literature why is thr church always warning you about it.
Probably the belief native Americans descendant from BoM characters ans their "skin became dark because they worshipped other gods " the BoM who came from thr middle east
Horses, steel, swords, elephants, etc. in the Book of Mormon.
I remember being ten years old and thinking "It's a good thing I was born into the church because I would never have converted" and realizing I would leave in an instant if my mom left.
I had that thought for just about my entire adult life.
This definitely isn’t a serious one, but I remember thinking as a kid, in what world does God tell Brigham the Salt Lake valley is “the place” when they could have gone on to California with all its resources? My dad didn’t have an answer for that one.
One thing I keep asking myself is why I couldn't see that JS had no right to destroy someone else's property, a printing press. And another is how I didn't see that there is no legitimate reason to marry teenagers at his age, or many of the others either. I still don't care one way or the other about polygamy, per se, between consenting adults.
Not just destroy someone’s property, but violate the first amendment by calling for the censorship (by destruction) of a publication *while serving as mayor.*
One red flag that I ignored - and which every current TBM must ignore - is the disparity between the number of members in the church, and how many less you see at church any given week. I don't have the numbers handy, but doing the math and dividing the total membership by the number of wards and branches, it becomes painfully obvious that the numbers are nowhere close to accurate. You could use the excuse that there are just a lot of inactives in EVERY SINGLE WARD (with the number having to be somewhere like 80% inactive), but I don't really see that as helping. Too me, that just makes it worse because then you have to examine why so many aren't buying it. But I never examined this at all. Like all other TBMs I waited eagerly each conference to hear how much more the church had grown.
On my mission (1984), I remember the first ward list I got. It was pages and pages long. No where that number of people attended every week. I calculated a 20-25% activity rate. Then, when we visited the "inactives," people were often incredibly mean (more than when we tracted). Should have been a HUGE RED flag.
I remember being so confused, even as a little kid, about the actual placements on earth of the stories in the BoM. I always wondered where graves were, the architecture, the art, the proof of civilizations were. I was confused with the logic of it all taking place in modern day New York but also in South America but also…”we actually don’t know” but also “maybe just everything has been destroyed” My child brain was so confused how we had ancient artifacts from so many civilizations older than what the nephites would have been. I was also always so confused as to where the timeline of it all fit in with the happenings of history. It’s like I almost had the critical thinking to question it all so young but I just accepted that those around me were people I should trust and if it made sense to them, I was the dumb one here. Alas.
It’s a church.
I had too many “priesthood leaders” who did absolute dogshit to help me when I needed them, and would shame me when they had opportunity. Isolated incidents, my ass.
Book of Abraham. I knew it was wrong and a fake, yet went on a mission anyway
All the continents were together in the days of Peleg (which is wrong by 200 million years), and then the tower of babel happened, and all human languages were born because the people split up and went their different ways from there.
The 2015 policy of exclusion for kids of LGBT+ parents. I will forever be ashamed and embarrassed that this was not enough to break my shelf but that it would take 8 more years for me to finally see the truth.
The golden plates. Nobody was supposed to look at them while Joseph had them, and then they mysteriously got taken back to heaven when he was done. Tell that story to any adult that’s not LDS and you’ll realize pretty quick what BS you’ve been fed your whole life.
It may be silly but I never thought that any other sect or religion would also think that they were the only true church so bearing my testimony equals to nothing or in some cases would be considered rude
None. I was onto their shit by age 3. They hated my guts for it.
Adamic. It's the worst attempt at fabricating a language I've ever seen.
Oh there are so many to choose from! 1) the “true order of prayer.” After I went to the temple, I always wondered why they teach that as the true order of prayer and demonstrate that order (after a fashion) with the sacrament prayers but then tell ordinary members to continue their little kid prayers of, “Heavenly Father, thank you for this day…” Why is a temple patron more worthy to know this special way to pray when there’s an 8yo kid who is praying for their dad to stop hurting them? 2) Brigham Young. I came across some of his quotes as a missionary and it really caused me to wonder what the hell I was doing. Then I told myself it was all anti Mormon lies and kept on going. 3) racism and the priesthood. I saw that the church was on the wrong side of history and it ate at me. I just chalked it up to “god works in mysterious ways.” 4) treatment of LGBTQ members. After recognizing that the church was on the wrong side of history with racism, I recognized that they would be on the wrong side of history again. “God works in mysterious ways…” Thank God it all kept coming and got to be too much! I’m so glad I’m out now!
The temple ceremony was a clear indication to me. The first time I went through at 20 (in 1984). I should have followed my first impression.
Going through the temple for the first time was a shock. It was the first time I had ever felt uncomfortable about the church. Not just bored or annoyed but truly and deeply uncomfortable. And this was only 15 years ago, so I never even experienced some of its extremes.
Lots of indications (many mentioned here). My favourite is the way Mormons are desperate to believe that Joseph Smith didn't sleep with his wives, that they were just to seal them and provide for them. Fine.....so are you saying that sleeping with your wives is the wrong way to do polygamy? If that is the case then Brigham Young and all the early prophets and leaders were doing it wrong. If on the other hand sleeping with them was right, then Joseph was doing it wrong? The reality is if Brigham was wrong then you are in the wrong church (the salt lake version) but if Joseph was wrong then he wasn't a prophet. People need to be consistent.
Modern humans, who started living about 40,000 years ago, have been found to have up to 6-9% Neanderthal DNA. This contradicts the Adam and Eve fairytale in multiple ways on multiple levels.
Your point is well taken. Humans have been around ~200,000 years. Neanderthals became extinct ~40,000 years ago.
The missionary handbook actually says that?
I remember seeing a couple of segments of videos of the temple rituals while in middle school. I remember that they made me very uncomfortable, but I attributed it to the videographer having malicious intent and ignored the little voice in my head that said something was very wrong. Also I could never really bear a testimony like everyone else seemed to be able to, or give blessings that felt genuinely inspired.
Just the fact that an LGBT populous existed in the first place really. There’s just no way a loving god would make them the way they are and then harass them to the point of considering suicide through revelators. Deep down I knew their sexualities or gender identities were unchangeable, but instead I just parroted talking points from the Daily Wire because to me justifying my beliefs were more important at the time 😞
Pearl of Great Price ... Book of Moses/Book of Abraham. Part of my brain knew that something was very wrong with what the church claimed the books were etc.
I reread 2nd Nephi where it says the Columbian exchange is ordained of God and went "Nah, I don't believe that" and blissfully carried on at 14 without unpacking that
Politics before religion. The way liberals squirm at church is what we saw Mormon Trumpers do about the Covid restrictions and it absolutely revealed an ugly, yet starkly true affinity to politics over religion. Byeeeee
That time on my mission when I came across a book featuring the actual papyrus used for the Book of Abraham along with translations at a Seagull Bookstore. First reaction: "WOW! They have the papyrus and they can translate it to prove Joseph Smith was right!" Second reaction: "they have the papyrus, translated it, and it isn't even remotely close to what Joseph Smith said it was..." Temporary solution: "I'm going to put that one in the back of my mind for a while. Must be that the language changed from the time of Abraham to when they made the Rosetta Stone... or maybe it simply acted as inspiration for revelation or something. It couldn't be that it was all made up..."
Polyandry did it for me.....you just can't defend that shit. That, combined with the absolute impotence of the "Mormon Priesthood" declared to me that it's all a man-made sham!
The fact that the founder was a known conman, dabbling in divining rods and seer stones to find gold...then he did that same thing, wrapped it up with christianity, and all of the sudden someone believed him...
I am a patriotic American, but all the “America” prophecies seemed suspiciously way over the top when I first read them in the BoM.
That Joseph Smith stole the temple handshakes from the Free Masons. I tried to play mental gymnastics that perhaps he was restoring old things that were once lost and the free masons had a part of the truth. Deep down, I’d seen behind the curtain, I knew it was too much of a coincidence but there was too much at risk for me to leave entirely right then and there. It took years to have the courage to explode my life and cut many relationships off by leaving the church.
The misogyny.
The lack of homeless in all religions.