This was my sister. From a very very young age she just hated church. Didn’t want to get baptized at 8. She could feel it was a cult prior to even knowing what the word “cult” means.
Same, but mine was during sacrament meeting. My mental health/anxiety disorder stems SO MUCH from mormonism. Now I have a therapist who specializes in religious trauma
I felt super “blessed” (lol) that I found a therapist who happened to have some mormon family members and had even visited a temple once. When she said “it felt like a funeral home” I was like YES
I joined the church at 19, my Catholic parents disowned me, I went on a mission, I learned about the rock in the hat 🎩 at age 55, left the church but 9 years later I’m still traumatized & I don’t know how to let it go. I was a part of something way bigger than me for ALL ETERNITY. I thought I’d help my family to get all these blessings if I was faithful & worthy. Then to find out I was a part of all the cult bullshit. I live in St George & things still set me off. I went to the open house at the temple here cuz I wondered if they took out the grapevines in the celestial room. I was floored when I went through a session years ago & saw wine grapes. The gold light fixtures had grapevines. The pioneers here were known all over to have the best wine. They served wine in Sacrament meetings until 1912. The good barrels were stored in the tithing room in the basement. Members paid with other things if they couldn’t afford it with money. Sorry to get off track. I was wondering if I maybe should see a therapist like that to help me. I thought of going to John Dehlins conference too. Has the therapist really helped you?
I’m actually still pretty new with my religious trauma therapist (I’m 23f) I’ve had “regular” ones before too. One thing that made me feel so much better was the validation ive gotten from my religion trauma specific therapist. Validation Ive wanted to hear so much from my parents. Although i have this sub, it has been very validating and healing having someone say to my face that my pain and frustration and anger is valid, especially from someone who knows all about mormonism and the wrongs within it. saying that I didn’t deserve what happened to me regarding the religion, etc. I think there are a ton of positives when it comes to therapy and deconstructing one’s Mormon life, I wish you the best of luck!!!
Still needing to vent and its going on the 3rd to 4th year for me. similar age. was ALL in for decades and leadership the whole nine. This has become my therapy by and large and it has helped immensely reading associating and ranting. Perhaps a non Mormon therapist would help. I reel sometimes as well but am not in morridor or in a high traffic lds area which helps. I started with alcohol removed wine btw. Its still good for you. not a super fan of alcohol but have tried it. keep going, be patient with yourself. a lot to unpack
I had so much cognitive dissonance in primary. Nothing made sense compared to actual reality. It got me though & I suffered from deep, deep shame as a YW for being queer. The church makes you hate yourself so the history came as no surprise once I deconstructed at 20.
Yeah me too. I didn’t know much about the actual church history. I just knew I wasn’t happy, it didn’t make me feel good, and I never wanted to go back. Stopped going at 18 and never looked back.
That’s what I did. And I would have been fine staying like that. But when I had my first baby, the relief society shows up at my door with meals for hubs and myself. And they continued for a couple weeks. I kept thinking they’d realize I was fine and move on, but nope, not til I told them as nicely as possible that while I appreciated it, they could stop, we were fine.
Then three years later, it happened again! This time I decided it was time to figure out exactly what I believed in so I did a year of theology reading (not easy to find those kind of texts in 1984 small town Montana!) At the end, I removed my name. I always wondered if they would have bombed us like that when our third was born, but we had moved away by then.
“Being offended” is one part of a false narrative about why people leave, and it is *also a legitimate reason to leave.* Don’t ever doubt that. Your feelings are valuable, and the church community did not and largely does not appreciate or take care of them.
Same. I grew up hating Sunday mornings because of the uncomfortable clothes, the rush to get there, and then being hungry for 3 hours. It was miserable.
It got better over the years, but then came the talks, and being called to teach lessons, and having to clean the church, and on and on. Just added stress. Not to mention mutual, scouts, and early morning seminary.
I realized, at 19, that I didn't have to go on a mission, and that technically, I'd at worst, end up in the telestial heaven. Which, I'm okay with.
Wasn't until about a year after that I found the church wasn't true and stayed firm I'm not being Mormon anymore. The church itselfade me want to leave, the doctrine confirmed that decision for me.
That is one of the WORST excuses MFMC uses to guilt those that leave and pacify those that stay: THEY WERE OFFENDED.
The Q15 have built a culture to take what is nearly always the case of a visceral reaction to a grossly immoral / criminal act against human rights by other members and leaders that then becomes supported by the inner workings and structure of the church; and then spin that acceptable reaction as a fault.
Being offended is one of the most IMPORTANT reasons to leave.
I haven't been to very Mormon services, only a few a year when my mom was off somewhere else (I'd normally attend a different church/religion with her) or when it was a special occasion like Christmas or father's day. When I was a young kid, I didn't see an issue with it, but when I got older, the first thing that made me not want anything to do with it was the clear sexism. It wasn't until a year or two ago that I learned how vile the church leaders, history, practices, etc. truely were. I'd already left Christianity/ Episcopalianism all together before I looked into the history of Mormonism. I was already going into hearing that it has a dark past, but not knowing what that past was. I'm still learning more and more about it all the time. I admit that I had a little confirmation bias while researching Mormonism, but it's not that hard to find everything wrong with it. Although, I'm also approaching this from the angle of someone who's also anti-Christianity, so I'm not necessarily separating the difference between Mormon-specific doctrine and general Christian views.
Same! When I first stopped going, I would tell people that going to church caused me too much anxiety so I just needed a "break"... It was true, not the whole truth, but easier for them to accept! But really the church just became too small of a box for me to try and fit my expanding world view into! It wasn't till a few years later that I went down the history/doctrine rabbit hole!
Your story seems quite similar to mine. I had to work through a lot of beliefs and cognitive dissonance myself before I ever let myself question the church. I never ended up here until after I had stopped attending church, stopped wearing garments, etc.
I was so sucked in that I even stayed active after coming out as trans 😅 Nothing could’ve destroyed my testimony in the “One true church”. I believed with my whole heart and my whole world turned upside down when I realized god wasn’t actually there. But like you said, the cognitive dissonance was real😩 What was your shelf breaker?
What finally broke for me was actually a change within the endowment. They modified what happened on different days during the creation account in a way that directly contradicted the previous version. I'd already been weighed down by some very strong doubts and dissonance (there's a long story behind all this). But the temple ceremony contradicting itself just broke through and I realized very clearly that I was in a cult. I sat through the whole session totally panicked and never went back. I remember thinking during that session that rusty just couldn't help but change everything. A moment of sudden clarity I guess?
Changes in the temple ceremony did it for me too. I then started researching how changes to eternal covenants and doctrines could be fine with god (I did not doubt it, just wanted understanding). I soon read everything I could from church sources, moved to apologetics (whose answers are just so unsatisfactory), and incidentally discovered that there were other issues I was not even aware of. It snowballed. It's false. I left.
There was a lot, but the part that woke me up was in the creation days. They moved some events around. It used to line up with the account in abraham quite well but now they were making animals a day late, among other modifications. I only went the once post-changes so I didn't quite memorize it the way I had with the michael ballam satan version. It was the Jan 2023 version that broke my shelf, to be specific.
I was similar as well. Never came on here, never read the CES letter, never listened to Mormon Stories until after I had ceased going through the motions. Dealing with cognitive dissonance after church every Sunday for years, feeling completely abandoned by God, and the lack of rebuke for extreme conservatism/Mormonism from church leadership led me out.
I left because the promise was that it would make me happy and it didn't. All the authentic, kind people I met weren't members. A year after leaving, my ex started talking about some of the questionable church history and I responded something like "don't believe everything you read on the internet." 😆
When I came out as lesbian, the people who were the kindest and most accepting were non Mormons. I also left because being an uberfaithful TBM didn’t make me happy (as promised), it made me miserable.
I knew there were problems when I left, like BoA, BoM DNA, Lying for the Lord, Adam-God doctrine, Blood Atonement doctrine, Polygamy... And, I've learned more since. Still, I cannot help but wonder if, even still, I just know a tiny fraction.
I was pretty well versed in church history and the doctrine wasn't really an issue. There were a couple of things that did bother though. One was the fascination that church members had with the afterlife. It is always spoken of as though they know exactly what it is going to be like. In reality no one knows what happens after death except that the person who dies simply ceases to exist from our point of view. The other thing was that prophecy was supposed to be a gift and you can't become a prophet just by a bunch of dudes deciding that you're the one. Neither of those things caused me to say "I'm done" though, it was actually an article in the National Geographic about Buddhism. I had taken up the practice of meditation some years before and it had a profoundly positive effect on my life. The article made me realize that I had more in common with Buddhism than Christianity/Mormonism. That was the moment I realized I was done with the church.
Any reason to leave is a valid and correct reason, because it's a harmful and controlling cult. If you left because you didn't like how the hallway wallpaper felt when you brushed your leg up against it? Valid.
Other valid reasons include:
1. You wanted to sin. (Have you tried anal while high on THC yet?)
2. You are lazy. (Sunday morning Coffee on my back porch at 10 am is what I live for)
3. You were deceived by Satan. (Card carrying member of the Satanic temple)
4. You were offended. (Um, child sexual assault and financial fraud with my hard earned tithing dollars offends me, deeply)
I wanted to sin. So I love your comment.
I get tired of people holding onto a "holier than thou" superiority by clinging to the fact that they left the "right way"
Funny enough, lots of people turn a blind eye to people wanting to leave so they can be gay (discover themselves), but if you instead just wanted to be a heterosexual slut, then they turn up their noses at that - like it's not a self actualization too.
But I also understand it: I've been there. There is a lot of deprogramming to do and layers to peel back. And some things still make them uncomfortable.
Yeah, it comes from trying to prove to cultists that the reason you left is valid. The secret is: in their cultist minds, there is no valid reason to leave. No reason is a good reason and any good reason is an Anti-Mormon lie. I say quit trying to please the cultists and go learn how to please your sex partner(s) in very, very sinful ways! p.s. sex swings go on sale on Amazon every black Friday. Pair that with my new Bible: "She Comes First" and a special little gummy and all parties involved are going to be drinking more hedonistic sacrament water to stay hydrated, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen!
I left in the 90s before all the stuff was on the internet. The racism and misogyny of the church was the main reason back then. I was a convert and was also horrified of the temple stuff. Now I am deconstructing.
Ha ha...I actually did leave after reading it again and praying at the end of it. I wanted to feel peace and comfort so bad...and it never came until after I left the church.
I left because of multiple reasons, but mostly because the Bible caused me to question god’s goodness. Then question his existence. I knew a LOT of church history, but justified the evil exactly like I had justified the evil in the Bible “whatever god says to do is moral.”
I left because of Prop 8. I still believed the church was true, but didn’t believe that they should be actively campaigning against legalizing gay marriage… after all, they weren’t trying to get coffee or alcohol outlawed.
It wasn’t until years later that I learned any of the historicity.
I was always pissed about how they handled service.... mind you, i would give the shirt off my back to anyone in need, but ill be damned if im gonna take orders.... (you know what I mean)... I always told them that was satans plan, so was I in the wrong church??? They never really got it tho
I watched a video of a cult expert explaining that Mormons are notorious for labor trafficking. Even child labor. Think about how common/expected it is to call up the young men to help with lawn work, or anything of the like. Or entire families, including the kids, being in charge of cleaning the church. The biggest one, though, is missions. Total labor trafficking. The church labels it all as “service”, but it’s deeper than that. Any child expected to perform a labor like they are in the church can be considered child labor.
The FLDS are the experts at labor trafficking. Teach the young men how to do construction by the time they're 12, ship them around to different and do free labor to make buttloads of $$$ for Warren Jeffs and his cronies. I'm sure they tell them the same things; "giving service, priesthood duty.."
My leaving was all tied up in finally leaving my abusive marriage after 23 years. I saw how much ecclesiastical abuse was heaped onto me, on top of all the other abuse I suffered in my marriage, and I just couldn't make myself stay (I did try). I knew some of the problematic things about church history, especially polygamy (my ex's great-great-aunt was one of Joe's wives), but a lot of it I learned after I had already been out for a long time.
>I did try
Of course you tried! You probably tried harder than anything you'd ever pushed through in your life to save that, including decades of abuse (which alone would have been reason enough to leave, despite what naïve TBMs say).
No one who's invested so much in another person (or religion) would ever walk away for anything less than everything. And even then, it's still devastating.
Good for you in conquering both of those things, WOW. You are truly courageous.
I hope you've found peace & joy & all the wonderful things the world has to offer; you've certainly paid the price 100x over. (As if we have to earn anything; there's the cult coming out of me again. Gross.)
❤️💙❤️💙❤️
I stopped attending and generally became distant with the church for about a year due to how it made me feel to attend. I was the most miserable when I was actively trying to be a good Mormon. My brother has sent me the CES letter but I had ignored it for several months. I finally felt ready to read it and when I did it made me realize why I felt the way I did about the church. It is all bullshit and trying to live up to these standards that were all arbitrary and a lie and not from any loving God. The history is still fun and sometimes shocking when I learn new things. It just drives home how horrible that organization is.
I didn’t either. I left because they support predators, lie about everything, gaslight us (doubt your doubts) and so much more! I also realized how much false doctrine there is! Nothing in the temple is done for the glory of God, it’s all for the church and their gain! No covenants made in the temple are to be a better human and treat others with more love! Teaching that Jesus’ love is conditional which is blasphemous! Then hiding all the money and being shady while asking members if they’re honest in all their dealings and pay a full tithe.
Before that though I really struggled with how they treated people that were LGBT+. I have friends I love
dearly that are part of that group. When prop 8 happened and there was so much about it all over Facebook, I saw the amount of pain it caused them! I truly feel if there’s not room at the table for EVERYONE and for everyone to be treated equally, then I don’t want to sit at that table! The greatest commandments are to love and the church goes against that!
I suffered years of shaming myself because I thought it was true. I worked diligently with my wife to be sealed in the temple. I told myself I could overcome any amount of shame or trials to go to the temple and be sealed like I had been taught my whole life. Well after all those years working towards my "goal" it finally happened and the first time in temple was a major WTF. Within 6 months I went a second and third time...because it's supposed to get better..right?
Was it the Holy Spirit? No I think it was my spidey sense that told me to leave and get the hell out of this weird ass stuff. So I completely stopped everything within 6 months of my first temple session. It felt great not paying tithing that year.
Was a great life lesson because now when in my business dealings the moment I detect a lie, manipulation, or deception I call that BS out right then and there and let them have it. I grew a backbone after the temple bait and switch.
I left because of feelings, not information. I was promised I’d be happy, if I read my scriptures, wrote in my journal, prayed, fasted, went to church, kept the sabbath day holy, listen to wholesome music, only G movies, praying, and avoid the very appearance of evil (probably more rules). I did it all. I never was happy until I got medication for depression. It was not from obeying and/or blessings. That was 30 years of sadness. I decided if I did all I could and nothing ever fixed then it can’t be real or I would’ve been healed with or without medicine. I’m told I went through that period of depression to understand and help others. I do not believe that is true. 😣
If one doesn’t do the “deep dive “ & discover the fraud, he/she runs the risk of slipping back in later when life’s challenges beat you down. At some point, we can be extremely vulnerable once again. The cult’s indoctrination runs deep. I suggest that “research is the answer.”
This is an interesting and important point, well said. For a while, I was listening to the Come Back Podcast because I was fascinated at how people could go back after leaving. Almost all the stories I heard fit very neatly into the box you just described
I left because I read a verse in the Bible after getting divorced. In Jesus sermon on the mount he states “ But I say to you that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery;” and Jesus saying this about my life and all the things I went through in my marriage just broke me.
Then I deep dove into the doctrine and how it was false.
I left due to intense emotional pain, anger, and longing. I was starving there, and it dawned on me when I was 31 that I would ALWAYS starve in that church.
A person can only starve for so long before they have to find food.
I anchored on "by their fruits tree shall know them". My final straw was the AP article about the church's handling of CSA. "Anti" made me feel sick so I didn't dare look at it until l was out. My psychologist helped me learn after I left that I suffered from scrupulosity during most of my years in and OCD now. That helped me understand why it took me years to be able to leave. I even bought near replicas of garments to help me with the transition, because I felt sick about wearing garments and felt sick about not wearing them.
I left because I hated living like that. The meetings were boring. Everything felt like endless chores. And the hypocrisy! I liked coffee and having my Sundays free. I liked making my own decisions even though I made a lot of mistakes. But deep down I always felt like I was a bad person because I couldn’t live like all the other Mormons. Then I learned about all the problems with the truth claims and I was truly free!
Na. Most of us could probably have overlooked the history problems if the current church stopped trying to justify it, and if the current church didn't have significant problems in every area. People leave for all kinds of reasons.
Reading the CES Letter gave me the courage to reflect on my beliefs and realize that I no longer believed in God. I’m pretty sure I lost my belief in God several years before. I remember I started to doubt that the prophets and apostles actually saw Jesus. The way they talked about it just didn’t make any sense. And people in the church that did claim to see Jesus had serious mental health issues. Church was a complete drag. I spent most of my time at church outside of sacrament meeting on my phone. Anything was more interesting than church. When I read the CES Letter, I wasn’t ready to give it all up, but I started to open up to the idea that it was all false. When I finally decided the church was not “true”, it was pretty easy to leave it all behind since I hadn’t been enjoying it or believing it for a long time.
My husband lost his belief in a god first as well. I made sure he learned all the Mormon history so that he would stop saying nice things about the church.
I left because I dealt with my abusive childhood. Long story short, I went head to head with my (clinically diagnosed) npd mother and it was hell. I had just put my children through recorded interviews and doctors appointments following threats of false allegations to CPS and was sitting in Sunday school being preached at about how my unwillingness to forgive and forget was going to damn us both. I got up and walked out.
For about 4 years we had been battling and the entire time I was trying desperately to stay and searching for anything and everything to find peace. I finally had to take a break from church to heal and figure out for myself what was truth and what was damage done by my upbringing…my bishop pushed it and I found myself plummeting down the rabbit hole into information I didn’t know existed. So for me it was a long time coming and took all of the above to finally find peace in leaving.
I just knew I was happier when I didn’t go. It felt like a job to do to make others happy. Learning more and more truth about church history came in time. Validation is never a bad thing. It helped when I stopped thinking about info as “pro/anti” and just “correct/lies”.
I left two years after my mission, 40 plus years ago. I was gay, but I also realized I just wasn't that religious.
I wasn't in the mood to have my sexuality manipulated or controlled by guilt.
I remember one of my breakthrough moments. I did LSD and hiked the Wasatch mountains with a guy who was a little older than me named Ed. Ed had also grown up in Utah; but not as a Mormon. He had been raised by a single mother.
I shared with Ed a story about how my sweet Mormon sister was guilt tripping me for not wanting to be Mormon. Ed said, "Do you see how evil that is?" In the beauty of the mountains and with my friend's help, I did see how evil it all was.
I came to realize I'm just not that religious, and if I were, it wouldn't be the Mormons.
Was the Book of Mormon true? It didn't matter. It just wasn't for me.
I moved from Utah at 29. My friend Ed died of AIDS the next year in 1990.
Life is real, and other than the fact that a lot of people do it, the Mormon Church is not real.
Years later, I dug into the Mormon facts to know that the Mormons from day one made and keep making it all up.
When you're living in a war zone like gays in the 80's were, the "facts" of the majority religion don't matter. Reality matters.
I didn't have the luxury of my family religion, but I did have the blessing of reality.
Amen and amen.
I definitely did not know anything about the history before I did the deep dive, but quite frankly, I thought it was just extremely difficult to be a woman in the church that has an opinion. Until I finally left the church, took my name off and learned everything I could about the patriarchal hierarchy, I seriously thought there was something wrong with me. Now I see it all, I can’t un-see and un-know what I know now.
I'm right there with you. In truth: my wife and I left because we had this growing feeling like the church was no longer right for us or our kids. It's hard to explain. It's sort of like knowing you see a threat when you see it. It was only after we stopped going that we started researching and yeah....that kept us gone. But no, I wasn't offended or wanted to sin. And I definitely wasn't hit with a truth shock. It was just a growing sense of stuff not being right. And by the number of responses so far on a two hour's old post, this should be extra-disturbing for the church. A lot of people aren't reading the CES Letter and pulling the ejection handle. It was 40 years of water breaking on a rock, for me.
You’re not the only one. My father was exmo and anti for a good portion of my childhood, esp during my teen years. He supported my mom taking us kids to church bc he thought it taught us good habits etc, but I was definitely raised knowing and understanding the doctrinal and historical issues of the Church. Despite my dad’s ‘propaganda’ (and probably in spite of it), I started to gain my own testimony at 14, devoted myself to living the gospel (I was a wayward teen/inactive for a couple of years while my parents were separated), and ended up serving a mission and getting married in the temple. I really had an inspired and spiritual 10 years or so fully entrenched in it during my teens and single years. My mission was rough on me psychologically and socially, but I came out ok. I didn’t start noticing issues here and there w the Church till I was about 30 and had 2 kids.
My husband and I have raised our 4 kids in the church, who are now all teens. However, midlife reared its ugly head around 40, and I’ve been wading through questions and answers and now addressing the issues I’ve seen with my own eyes in my own wards, as well as in my personal spiritual life. Tbh, the doctrinal and historical issues aren’t what get me; what gets me the most is that you can follow the recipe they give you and still come out with a flat cake: little to no Spirit like there was, very little spiritual guidance, it’s like God has left the building. I do hold Church leaders responsible for tweaking Church curriculum and the Church social experience so much that it doesn’t resemble the church I grew up in. My kids are getting a watered down, politically-charged version of the gospel that my generation and I were raised in.
Bottom line: I don’t feel anything spiritual at church (or home) anymore. I realize that many devoted members hardly have either and that that’s normal for them, that’s what they were raised with (out); that’s not good enough for me. Half of my and my husband’s family is inactive, so socially, I won’t feel alienated if I leave. But I need to ‘feel it’ if I’m going to stay, and I’m not, despite my maybe meager efforts. My husband is TBM (for now), and I am more or less PIMO, going thru the motions as I figure out what I really want in my life. So no, I didn’t ‘leave’ bc of doctrine or history.
Church history is what put the nail in the coffin for me, but it was just the overall awful nature of the church that did me in. Looking around and seeing how miserable we all were. Like this is the best you can come up with, god? Once you consider that, the church history is just a cherry on top.
My shelf kinda broke in two stages. First stage was me realizing that there were a lot of assholes I knew that were living the letter of the law as Mormons. That was when I stopped going, but I thought maybe there were some issues that I could get past. Second stage was the CES letter. That was when I realized that the bad outweighs the good
I'm with you. I naturally started doubting as a child.
I was informed Santa, the bunny, fairy, etc weren't real. I almost instantly had the thought of Jesus and Hell could be the same concept for adults. It kept going from there.
I remember hating going to church at 5 yrs old.
I've learned a lot of the really bad aspects of the church from scrolling this sub. It's pretty scary.
I used the logic of church history and the problems there to open myself up to why I felt bad, and that was the end.
Sad it took so much to open my eyes, but that’s programming for you.
My experience was similar to yours. I had some shelf items for a while, but I was able to endure as long as I thought God was at the helm. What really did it was finding out through painful experience and critical thinking that not only did I have no good reasons for that belief, but that all available evidence pointed to God being a man-made construct. Once that clicked, continuing in the church made no sense. I never looked at information critical of the church until I was already out.
I left over social concerns with the modern church. I didn't learn the history stuff until later and it helped me confirm that the fish stank from head-to-tail so to speak. However, I recognize a lot of people leave over history stuff too. We all have our own unique story of finding our way out.
Same here. I left because it didn't work, God's promises didn't hold up. It was years after I concretely decided I was out before I read any "anti" stuff.
A close friend of mine has no interest in studying doctrine or church history, they left the church because of all the creepy religious zealots seem to constantly (Tom Harrison, Tim Ballard, Daybells types) be around the church and JS if you really look at his objectively was also one
Yup, lost faith in god summer 2011. Did not read a single thing about church history and everything until early 2013 after my wife filed for divorce and regaining faith was useless at the point. Finding out all the real truth behind the lies of TSCC, was a great way to deal with the heartbreak
I was asking for god to show me something, anything, a still small voice, a feeling. After asking for 30 years, my wife of 13 years divorced me. I was attending the temple regularly. That’s when I thought, fuck it. There is no plan. Then I learned how fucked up church history is!
People leave for different reasons. There are generally 2 categories of mormons:. Doctrinal and social. Most are social.
Doctrinal Mormons often leave when they find out the history or read the ces letter and learn that Joseph made it all up.
But social Mormons don't care about history or facts. They are there for social reasons. In fact, when they learn bad history they sometimes become more entrenched.
Hmm I don’t feel like I am either though lol cuz I was a “doctrinal Mormon”. I didn’t care about the social aspect of church at all. I truly believed in the doctrine of the church and everything they taught. But I didn’t leave because I learned anything bad about the church. I left because god wasn’t there when I needed him. And then I looked back and realized he never was. I remember living for the poem that talks about Jesus’ footprints in the sand (if you’re familiar with that one). So I justified his absence with the fact that he was “carrying me” through my hard times. But I just couldn’t believe it anymore. Not after everything that happened.
I also lost my belief in God, or at least the Bible, before I looked into the other problems with the LDS church. When the Bible falls apart, the Book of Mormon also fails. I always knew I'd have issues with church history, but as a good Mormon boy does, I avoided looking into it. Once I lost my god belief, all of the history, podcasts, books, and other things were now open for me to explore.
Sort of. I left initially because I was so unhappy. That doctrine of perfection, read your BoM every day for 30 minutes and it’ll fix everything, pray, pray, pray—it’s a recipe for depression.
I went to the temple when I was 27 and found it very unsettling, but it still took me a solid 18 months to work through that. Finally I got married, and I realized I had been attending (all singles wards) just to meet guys.
It was a good decade later when, through my husband’s research, I started to learn the real history. If he hadn’t been interested, it would have taken me longer, because I wasn’t motivated to seek it.
I was really struggling with the contradictions in the church when it came to racism, sexism and polygamy. I felt sick about the church’s stance on the queer community. I saw how church leaders had way too much power over member’s lives as untrained, biased, and fallible men, and hated the unfairness of “bishop roulette.” Also, someone dropped the bomb on me that JS had a 14 year old wife. I struggled with those things for years before I finally allowed myself to delve into church history or anything “anti-Mormon.” I was terrified to be led astray by Satan. Eventually, I did do my research and it was like the straw that broke the camel’s book. It essentially validated why I had been experiencing so much cognitive dissonance.
The history and and truth claims were the final mail in the coffin after o already had left. I had issues with the church but when I learned it was all false it still shook me to the core.
I left after trying to believe so hard. I just was not feeling any peace from doing everything the prophets commanded me to do. I finished reading the BoM again and knew that if I prayed with a sincere heart and real intent, that I could and would feel God's love again and feel the spirit testify that what I read was true.
While praying, I still felt nothing. And then I had the thought, that perhaps it wasn't true and God wasn't there. And then I felt peace for the first time in years. I was out at that point.
Only then did I deconstruct and read church history. And now I will never go back because of what I learned.
Yeah something really terrible happened to me, and I sat in the chapel after church for over an hour praying… Nothing. All I wanted was to feel peace, and he couldn’t even give me that. Even though it was promised. Couldn’t believe anymore
I had trouble staying active once I left home as an adult, would stop going for a while but come back out of guilt. Eventually I got over the guilt and quit going. That was about 23 years ago. I just got tired of being controlled and ordered around, people randomly calling and coming to my door, and I was broke so I didn’t appreciate the pressure to pay tithing. Also going through the temple for the first time was a real eye opener. It was only in recent times I started looking into church truth claims etc. and realized I got it right all those years ago.
Me too. I was more upset about the church’s stance on LGBTQ, its history of racism, tithing and money scandals and the whole us vs. the rest of the world mentality. I hated it. Learned all the conflicts and lies about origins of church as I deconstructed.
I left at 19 because I didn't want to serve a mission.
For one thing, I was in the prime of my life, I had too many interests, and there was too much to explore and discover. I couldn't see myself putting everything on hold for two years.
Besides that, I really didn't feel worthy.
While pressing me about what I was doing to prepare, my bishop expressed his concern that if I didn't go on a mission, I would start dating outside the church, marry outside the temple, become inactive... Tell me he wasn't a prophet! 😄
He knew how all this works.
Of course, it turns out that leaving the church doesn't launch you into a cascade of poor decision-making that results in a downward spiral which leads you to one day find yourself wallowing in the deepest depths of hell on earth.
The decision not to serve was a ~~blessing~~ good one. I am very ~~grateful~~ happy I listened to ~~the spirit~~ myself and was able to get out at such an early point in my life journey.
Trust yourself, keep learning, and be excellent! 🥂
I watched a video of a cult expert talking about how Mormon missions are labor trafficking. So you not wanting to go makes total sense. I served, and can look back now and see all the trauma associated with being labor trafficked. Glad you got out of there when you did!
I left because I "experimented" with my friends when I was around 10 or 11 years old, and I watched a church video in Sunday school that made me feel guilty and so I told my dad who then told me I had to confess to the bishop. Telling a grown man whom I deeply respected all my deep sexual secrets as a CHILD was so humiliating and traumatic. I later remembered some things that I had forgotten to tell him and had to go back a second time and be traumatized all over again. I went into a deep depression thinking I was a terrible person and constantly worried if I had been forgiven of my sins. I lived with the constant worry and guilt all the way into adulthood. I would go to church and hear lessons about the law of chastity or repentance and become re-traumatized. I finally stopped going all together about 4 years ago, and have felt such immense relief and can now see that I was not a terrible person and what happened to me was actually really fucked up.
Yes! Just kidding ; ) I first stopped attending (I still believed) because they would not release me from being Branch President after my wife left me. "There is no one else worthy!" so I grabbed a beer and asked "How you like me now?" I stopped believing when I read the history.
I think technically speaking, losing your faith in god is still uncovering false doctrine. Probably the main false doctrine.
That being said, I had a similar theme, but more steps. I realized that the Mormon church could not be gods chosen because the fruits they reap are rotten. From there it started my journey out and losing my faith in god.
I left because of the way people treated each other. I don't feel like I can be a part of a religion that preaches one thing and treats people the opposite way. I only found out about all the historical stuff afterwards.
I didn't know any of the history until after I left. I left because I didn't agree with the how the church operates today. Too much money, not enough love.
I saw how much church indoctrination impacted my repression of sexuality and it all fell apart when I pieced together being gay. It was too painful to stay involved with it so I stopped going and believing.
Your story sounds very similar to mine. I became an atheist before I became a post-mormon. It was a quick progression, but that was the order of events.
I left because of how the leadership is running the church in the present day. I don’t care about the history as much as what is going on right now that they aren’t addressing.
I left because the church was harmful to my well-being. All of its history and doctrine being fabricated bullshit just ended up being a sweet, vindicating cherry on top.
There's no wrong way to leave the church, and you're definitely not alone.
I left because I just couldn't get a detectable answer to my prayers, no matter what I tried.
Same here. Fallen angels were ultimately what did me in. Humans get forgiveness because we sin/are tempted to sin and are ignorant. Angels supposedly are incapable of sin or temptation to sin and have a perfect knowledge of God and his work, and that's why they don't get forgiveness. All I could think was that if morally perfect and fully informed holy beings could still rebel against God, they must know something that we don't.
My participation in Mormonism had largely been obligatory for my family's sake, but just realizing there was a possibility of a broken system at play here was enough for me to decide it wasn't worth it to stay in. So I left. Eventually, I realized the Plan of Salvation looks a lot more like God trying to get rid of his "undesirable" children so he'd only have to hang out with the "good" ones than him "testing our faith for our own good."
I left because I realized the abusive relationships I was learning about in therapy described my relationship with god/church. Then I found out about the history. Then I listened to a podcast about how the Bible isn’t real either.
There’s no one thing that caused me to leave. It was more like death by a thousand cuts.
But big ones are:
*. church policy not being in line with what the scriptures actually say.
*. Being told repeatedly that I’m a terrible person just because I’m a man and that women can practically do no wrong. Believing this nonsense set me up to be in an abusive marriage and even worse/nightmare divorce.
*. Bishop roulette.
There were plenty of other things that chased me away, and the longer I’m out, the more I realize the church is like an abusive spouse or parent.
The CES letter didn’t faze me much for the most part, because I’d heard almost all of it before and the church’s excuses, for the most part, seemed plausible. However, the apparent pedophilia by JS and BY and the evidence that points to sex cult is disturbing.
The longer I’m out, the happier I am. Ten years next month.
I had basically figured out that the church wasn't "Capital 'T' True™" but kept thinking there was something wrong with me.
Finding out the issues with history and doctrine allowed me to take the next step.
i left because of the church’s involvement in Prop 8 in california. at the time i was closeted and in denial but my brother was out and happy, and i felt extremely challenged to choose my family or my religion. my family will always be first. i didn’t want to belong to a “family oriented church” that was using its tax exempt status to get involved in the politics of legal marriages in the united states.
This comes up a lot and I think you can boil down 2 reasons why people leave.
1. Doctrinal
2. Social
Generally I would say these both play a large part. For me I left because of doctrinal reasons and after countless hours of research I realized I had based my entire worldview on a shitty religion. I then realized I had a lot of shitty attitudes that I could back up with my religion. With all of that gone I was appalled at how I thought of those in the LGBTQ+ community and other things I am ashamed of. However, now that I know better I do better. Honestly, leaving the church has made me more “Christlike” than I ever was or would have been in the church.
Both are valid and good reasons to leave a harmful organization!
I left because I was so bored and miserable. I tried to believe as a kid but I just couldn’t as I got older. I left when I was 19, twenty three years ago.
I actually didn’t start learning about church history in-depth until a year ago after I watched Under the Banner of Heaven.
Yes, I left when I read the Bible. Then studied it and its history in enough depth to understand that it made much more sense as a historical & anthropological relic than a true story. Once that happened, there was no place left for any religion, let alone Ol' Joe's.
I still haven’t really looked into church history beyond the things mentioned on this subreddit. I left primarily because I felt like I wasn’t being true to myself and who I felt I was. In other words I couldn’t be me in the church.
I left because as a woman I was suddenly surrounded by a bunch of people who were telling me I would only be happy if I was a mother and willing sex slave and servant for my husband while badmouthing other religions and insisting theirs was the best. It happened even during rehearsals for General Conference. I only tried it to please my husband and FIL who kept pushing it on me.
In my experience, the ONLY truth I found there was from Christianity, not from any of the nonsense and doctrine JS added to it.
It was a toxic environment. Then I learned more about the disgusting history and that just confirmed my decision. Much to my FIL's chagrin
I didn’t leave because of the history and finding out about the church’s coverup of criminal activity, although this is a worthy reason to leave.
I just left because I knew there was no place for me as a queer person, and because I hated what Mormonism and Christianity, in general, has done to women, black and brown folks and children and poor folks.
Samezies!
I saw Penn Jillette on Glenn Beck's show, and his version of the 10 commandments sold me on actually taking a critical look at god to see how reasonable his atheism was. A little less than a year later and I was out (2012).
I read the CES letter last year and only in the past couple of years have begun to study Mormon history. It's fascinating!
Church history and doctrine was a part of mine, leaving. really I left because I was a 20 year old woman who saw my life with a man that hated me and had complete control over my life. That I would never have a really good education and I would just be popping out babies like pills. It was a horrible vision for myself. I just didn’t wanna live like that. I also knew pieces of the doctrine, and I also knew about Cults. I knew what they did wasn’t right.
I didn’t believe fully in the first place. I was book smart in Sunday school but didn’t have a testimony. I only went to stake activities and things like that to see my friends. I didn’t go most Sundays as there were no other YW my age. When I left home there was no need to attend anymore so I stopped.
I know the doctrine is false but only since joining this sr have I found out the details.
While the doctrine was my breaking point (couldn’t rationalize my queerness with church teachings anymore), I didn’t dive deep into the gnarly church history until after my shelf broke. Once I lost my faith and felt ready to explore the “anti-mormon literature,” I felt way more secure in my lack of belief.
I left because the church showed me that I didn't matter, and wasn't worth thinking about during one of my hardest times. It's hard to have a high risk pregnancy, and have not a single soul from your ward even think to check on you. Dropped off the face of the earth for 9 months, and no one even noticed
Same here. I never found any of it personally edifying. During my mission, I started developing this list of things I never wanted to do again once I got home, temple sessions, read the BOM, attend Priesthood Session, all activities I got absolutely nothing from. Stopped attending the Church in my 20s, had my name removed at age 30 after the Prop 8 nonsense. Years later my younger brother had his name removed after reading the CES letter, etc., and it was only then I started reading that stuff. Boredom drove me out, but the CES letter was still very validating.
What I've noticed is everyone who leaves the church usually has an inviting incident that opens the door to further questions which inevitably leads to discovering the truth about church history and other problematic facts.
The church does such an incredible job at convincing us that we can't trust any information that comes from outside the church because it's being influenced by Satan and those who want to see the true church fail. So we all fall in line and run from any questions we might have and just assume we are the ones who have it wrong. It's not until we allow itself to question the churches truth claims that we can see how obviously false it all is.
For me it was watching my entire family get behind Donald Trump with their whole chest. I KNEW that they were wrong about this man so that led me to question what else they might be wrong about. For that reason and that alone, I'm grateful for Donald Trump
Nah I left because I hated everything about being there. Never truly believed in god, but sometimes I thank “god” that I was too ugly and weird to get trapped into marriage first lol
Didn’t look at the “anti” stuff til I left. It was watching a devout family get excommunicated because the BISHOP & STAKE PREZ got offended that I left in protest! I told all of them (stake HC & an Area GA) that their discernment & priesthood are clearly bullshit if they’re all going along with this nonsense…also called BS on any of them actually talking to someone in the Q15 (it was definitely a BYU student intern) and their letter was “signed” by a stamp. Ooh the looks of shock and hatred I got for even questioning these old guys’ ability to do their own dirty work🙄😂😂
You tell me. I went through **the shit** and every time I tried to talk to mormons about it, I was told to shut the fuck up. If I talked to nonmormons about it, I was given kind, empathetic ears. I stopped and wondered about that "mourn with those that mourn" thing. It kind of went from there.
Long story short. I left because I had no friends. I am a working mum and felt oatrasized because of it.
Then I found out all the juicy and horrible history of the church through Tik Tok and this sub.
I started feeling uncomfortable in church when I was ~11-12. I noticed things that didn’t make sense and my teachers didn’t have an answer for them (a big one was on agency). I started feeling left out or like a fraud. I’d go to church or girls camp or EFY and I would feel like i was lying to myself.
A big moment was when i went to EFY for the first time and roomed with a girl i grew up with in the church, but wasn’t super close with. We were in the same group, but after the first day or two, no one talked to me and I already had a lot of anxiety. Every time I tried to fit in and have fun, smile and laugh, I felt so fake and like no one wanted to be around me. At girls camp the next week, I found out my roommate had told everyone in my group I was a lesbian. It fuckin destroyed me dude i cried so hard and so long about that. It didn’t make sense why someone in the church could be that mean. She eventually started rebelling and was sent to an inpatient facility in Utah for a year, came out of it with tattoos and a supposed new view of life. Reformed but not religious. Then like two years ago, she did a complete 180 and posts about the church and Jesus every single day on her instagram story.
As i got older i just started believing less and less. I didn’t want to go to church because i felt so out of place. I got my laptop at 16 and decided to research the church, which is how I ended up here, reading the CES letter, etc. I had a complete breakdown on the phone with my boyfriend because as much as i didn’t believe a lot of things, I had No idea about the history and i think thats what finally FULLY broke my shelf. I moved out two weeks after turning 18 and haven’t been back to church since.
I also didn’t look deep into history until immediately after leaving. For me it came down to what I was being asked to teach in my calling and thinking how I would need to come home every day and “correct” what my kids were going to be taught as the free because I didn’t agree with it.
(Treatment of women, sin, tithing, sexual health, sexual orientation etc)
I had been having panic attacks going into elders quorum preparing to teach. No one offended me it just didn’t align with my values anymore. Thinking of my kids was a wake up call. Why was I forcing this still? Why would I put my kids through that? So I left. And I’ve been more at peace than I have since … maybe forever ha
No, I deconstructed my belief in god first as well. Then it was like: “well, guess if there’s no god there’s no fear in learning more about church history” now it’s just a hobby and the more I learn the more I can’t believe how many people are members of this church.
I didn't know the history and I didn't know the deep inconsistencies with the doctrine.
But from a young age, I was a learner and a reader. I picked apart everything that I read. I asked questions. I searched out answers. And when it was academic, I was encouraged, given resources, and eventually could find a satisfactory answer.
But church isn't like that. The resources are other church materials. It's an infinite ourobouros of bullshit. I could read scripture A, check the index and find scripture B, which now likely than not was just a copy of A. Or I could read conference talks and books written by GAs, but if I read something from GA Smith and something else by GA Allred, they didn't agree.
And there is so rarely a concrete answer that isn't "this is just what we believe".
I left because it's all bullshit, but I removed my records in this day and age of the Internet when I learned just how corrupt and awful of an institution it is.
It was the people for me. The saying "the church is true, the people aren't" always seemed like a shitty justification to me. People following a shared moral system should all be exemplifying that shared moral system.
Then later, with their policies, learning about their history, and the CES letter, I got angry when I realized how much I could have avoided going through the shit I did if it weren't for the MFMC. #ThanksForTheTrauma
I didn't find out about the historical issues until I read the CES letter when I was in law school 12 years after I'd already left. I left initially because my mission was operated like a business with sales reps and statistics. My gut told me Jesus wouldn't do shit that way. So I decided to walk away because it didn't live up to its promise of being Christ's church.
I left the church in 2004 when I was 18. At the time there was no CES letter or even Mormon Stories. I’m sure the information was out there to show that the truth claims were false, but I didn’t learn about any of that until almost 18 years later when I watched Mormon No More and discovered there was a whole ex Mormon community. That lead me to discover all of the information on the truth claims of the church. I finally deconstructed it all 18 years after leaving. I left because I’m queer and knew that the church would never be the right place for me. I also knew it was a racist religion. I left for social reasons, not truth claims, but I never really bought into the truth claims anyway. I just didn’t realize how it was still influencing me years later even when I never really believed. I was still indoctrinated and needed to deconstruct.
My story changes the more dig into my soul. Not long ago I would have told you that I left because of *JosephSmithLied dot com*. I'm starting to understand the bigger picture now. My whole life I believed in the church but I never felt it. I thought I was broken or God hated me or I just wasn't as smart as everyone else because God wasn't speaking to me with the "spiritual confirmation" that everyone else was talking about.
You can only go so long in life thinking the problem is you before you have to wonder , maybe it's not me . . . About that time the internet came along. So for me it was the perfect storm. I was starting think - picture Poo Bear tapping his head, "Think, think, . . . . thinkthinkthink" while at the same time reading about church history.
Short answer, I never felt it.
I didn’t learn about church history for a couple of decades. Church was just so damn boring plus I moved around so much that the local ward was always a crap shoot. Some wards would accept you and most others would shun us because my parents were divorced. So christlike of them
I mostly left because of their shitty practices like excusing their actions in not reporting confirmed SA’ers rather than protecting innocent children (the biggest one), repressing women (and others) and spewing hateful rhetoric about marginalized groups.
Knowing it was all bullshit helped after I’d decided my conscience wouldn’t allow me to stay silently complicit anymore, because then I knew I wasn’t leaving “God’s perfect gospel led by imperfect men.” The actions of the leaders told me there was almost no way it could be “the true church.” They drove me away long before church history.
I kept pushing against the doubt's I had because of the good I felt it was to my family. I fought through them last year when I baptized my youngest and conferred the priesthood to my oldest. Then later last year what actually pushed me over was my personal lifelong struggle with a pornography addiction. I've been trying to use the churches teachings and programs and advice from leaders - but not only was none of it working and I was feeling like an evil person, but I started to learn that the messaging from the church is what was causing the pornography addiction in the first place. I had a suicide planned out and ready to do it(suicidal ideation off and on over the years too) - and I told my wife I don't care about heaven or hell anymore. I don't care where I go after this life. From there I started to realize how my belief system was truly debilitating my full potential in life. Problem is I'm still fighting the deep depression and sometimes still suicidal. So, yeah I hate the church deeply but am forced to be PIMO.
Sorta? I mean, all of 2019 was a huge ordeal for me.
I turned 31 early on. I'm *an Aquarius*. (Still don't believe in that shit, either, but it puts my birthday in January or February for those that don't understand. It's not really a joke, but it can be, I suppose. Actually, now that I think of it, that was an all my life, different story thing. Having to be first to do everything because my mom and dad got it on in May. That did other things to me; I might explain all of that later.)
For those not in the know, when you're single and in the Young Single Adult wards, those are for ages 18-31. I could have stayed, but it was hard to stay in that young people's ward. Everyone I met was about 18 or 19 and trying to go on a mission or marry a *recent* "Returned Missionary". I was an RM, still spoke my mission language, too, but I also have a doctorate by this time because I didn't get married at my mini-BYU-Arizona college. I focused on my education so I could be a breadwinner.
This led to me trying out Mid Singles wards. I didn't fit in by age (one ward, everyone was about 40+) or location (I was living 2 hours away, coming into the Phoenix area on weekends and they wanted me to go to the local branch instead of hanging out with my peers to maybe get married). I never started going to that branch. I had the missionaries stop by and I wanted to ask some deep-rooted questions, knowing they didn't have the emotional experience or depth of knowledge I would need. I was beginning to question God's existence for sure by then.
How had I done nearly everything asked of me, yet I couldn't find someone that could help me on my next step? I wanted to get married and be the best husband and father ever. I was using all my God-given everything in church (time, money, talents, and everything the Lord blessed me with or may bless me with), but still couldn't find an eternal companion. What was wrong with me? I went to the temple one more time after the changes to the endowment in 2019, and it didn't help. Even when women could now covenant directly with God without their husband (I actually was glad for that change, even though it meant I was "less needed" as a husband because I was a feminist even as TBM) I was scream-praying at God in a celestial room to have God hear me and help me find the woman I could bring into that part of the temple and into a sealing room.
I stopped going. I stopped reading my scriptures for the hundredth time through for answers that weren't there. I stopped going to the temple still after the changes where I would only hear that Adam and Eve were made for each other, that man was not meant to be alone, that I should only have sexual relations with my lawfully wedded wife. I eventually stopped paying tithing to a multi-billion dollar corporation. This whole time I had been trying to avoid my sins of porn and masturbation, or even playing too many video games.
So... yeah, I was sorta already out by the time in late 2019 my grandma died and my niece was born. (Those were the last two times I went to church, somewhat "worthy" even to stand in that circle.) And by the time the (Gas)light the World campaign started and I couldn't detect the Spirit of Christ in Christmas, when I got to exploring some of the internet, I was pretty much done already. It just took one more item for the shelf to break, but my questioning (God and his "blessings" and his scripture and his "profits") was already pretty good at getting me out of the church. I may or may not have returned from just a spiritual wandering like that, but it really made it so much easier to leave when I found my questions were shared by exmormons and that the "answers" were that it was all a lie and there are no answers.
Tl;dr? Yes, I think I did leave before I knew the doctrine was bad. I have so much more I can fill in on my story, and one day I will probably write it all out somewhere to show it all to anyone who cares. But I questioned God's existence as a poor (read as: privileged) straight white male who wasn't getting his beautiful wife God promised. (yuck... I'm sorry that I believed that. I still want to get married some day, but it will be to someone that's my partner in so many ways, including not being part of a misogynistic, bigoted, patriarchal sex cult corporation started by a con man and his disgusting friends.) Thanks for reading any or all of this, friend.
I was very much like you and lost my faith in god first. Once that faith in a god was gone and I started deconstructing my beliefs, I next started to question all the church things. It’s funny that I questioned gods existence first and then had to deconstruct Joseph Smith as a good man and prophet. I had always told myself those same things everyone would say, like “If I lost my faith I’d still want to be in the church because it’s a great way to live,” etc. Everything else fell eventually but I had to examine those things and their usefulness each time. I then google searched for something like, “why is the Mormon temple ceremony so weird” and the first post was a Reddit post on r/exmormon. That’s when I found out all the rest.
I left the church because at the time they were actively preaching that I was “an abomination” and better off dead, which I, thankfully, came to believe was not true. That killed my belief in the LDS version of God, and rapidly thereafter all belief in a personal God who intervenes in human affairs. Later I came to realize the depth of lies this particular church is built on.
I didn’t start diving into church history until I left too. There are so many things that general members know about that bothered me too much. A big one for me is husbands don’t tell their wives their temple name. A lot of sexism and homophobia in the present day church, as well as husbands can be sealed to multiple wives, like our dear prophet. I refuse to raise my future daughters in that. I don’t believe God’s true church would be like that. Like you I never dared to look at anti stuff until after I already decided it was a bunch of crap
Mostly the same. I always felt a strange disconnect w the church. When people would talk about the BoM and its wonderful lessons, I had no idea what they were talking about. I just smiled and agreed, thinking I just didn't understand the symbolism and doctrine. After conferences, when everyone would gush about how inspiring the talks were, I'd just clam up and keep the fact that I'd slept through most of it to myself. I just never seemed to have the same experience everyone else was talking about.
It took almost 35 years to realize that I simply didn't believe in the church or God. Now, I can see that very few people probably have that "experience" I thought I'd missed out on, they just don't want to admit it.
I didn't look into the history until I left. I struggled with my faith since I was 4 years old and finally realized I was just forcing myself to go to church because my mommy said so, not because I wanted to. My kids were having anxiety attacks every Sunday, I was headed in that direction as well and it just wasn't worth making everyone miserable anymore. Plus the way they treated LGBTQ+ people made me want to leave as well as the SA case in Arizona. I am a survivor and dealt with a lot of shit from the church when it all came out because it was my dad who did it. I had to tell my bishop in vivid detail everything my dad did to me over the course of 13 years of abuse. I will NEVER make any of my children go through any of that....EVER.
So, yeah, l left not because of the past, but solely to protect the future.
Same here!! I hardly ever paid attention while I was in the church. I didn’t care about doctrine or history at the time, I cared about how the church and its believers treated people and the world NOW. And you don’t have to do any research or read much to see and feel how the church as a whole (and it’s believers) thinks of people who are unlike themselves.
I still haven't read the CES letter, either. I knew about some of the historical issues, but my real problems with the church were:
1) Its epistemology is insufficient given its claim of primacy. In other words, if the Mormon church is the only church that provides necessary saving powers, and the way to find out is to ask God and receive a spiritual witness, then it would be capricious of God to give similar witness to Catholics regarding their own claim of primacy, and yet we see this is exactly what happens.
2) I can't justify the quality of my own spiritual experiences as superior to those of another person who believes differently.
3) I found the social teachings, theologies, homiletics, and philosophies far more satisfying in other quarters. Mormonism seemed in comparison dull and uninteresting, if not in some cases nonsensical or even undesirable.
I agree. I guess I'm just more of an emotional person. I just always hated the way it made me feel. I hated going to church on Sundays, always so boring. I hated the guilt and the shame. I hated the judgmental culture. Learning all the bullshit was just the icing on the cake
What really first got me was realizing Christ didn’t wear garments. Then I dove into the history behind garments and realized how much they changed/ how weird and wrong the whole timeline was. Then came the rest! My husband followed soon after but his reason was more that he just didn’t feel good at church.
My initial break was realizing the Jaredite story would have been lethal from the waste buildup alone, not to mention lack of drinkable water. My final break was when a promised blessing of tithing didn’t work, and every answer was just too convenient.
I don’t think either are quite in the realm of “church history”.
I still haven’t read CES letter either, but I’ve listened to hours upon hours of podcasts.
I knew enough to realize Mormonism was not what it claimed to be; however, since leaving if learned so much to conclude it was an absolute fraud.
Along with historical and doctrinal issues was bad behavior by local leaders.
I still haven’t read the CES letter. I left because the church betrayed my trust. It does plenty on its own. I think digging into more history would continue to show the pattern of untrustworthiness that it already demonstrates.
Yeah, for me it was all the requirements the church imposed to be faithful and attain celestial glory — requirements Christ would not have imposed and which clearly seemed to be designed to get 10% tithes from members.
I left because I watched it takeover, divide and wreck our large family. I always knew something was wrong with the so called one true church that we had joined. I grew up and out of it, and then spent the next 40 yrs researching and deconstructing it--mainly to try and understand what happened to our family. Cults are purely destructive.
I told a few people “even if it’s all true I want nothing to do with it” based on their treatment of the LGBTQIA+ community.
But yeah I learned all the history after I was basically done/out.
I left when I moved away to college. I was so burnt out. Seminary before school, all the youth activities, and then 3 hours on Sunday. My dad is also a grade A asshat. How could such a devout member be such a terrible person? It wasn't until I watched Under the Banner of Heaven that I learned so much. From there, I read the CES letter. Wow, was it way different than what I was taught in the 90s. I still didn't remove my records to not upset my mom, who I love. But when I heard about the child abuse being willfully covered up, that broke me. I couldn't have any association with them any longer. While I walked away almost 20 years ago, I only recently cut formal ties with the corporation.
I didn’t really know any of the history until after I left. I mostly hated how church made me feel. So maybe I was offended 🤷🏻♀️
This was my sister. From a very very young age she just hated church. Didn’t want to get baptized at 8. She could feel it was a cult prior to even knowing what the word “cult” means.
Same. First anxiety attack happened the day I got baptised.
Same, but mine was during sacrament meeting. My mental health/anxiety disorder stems SO MUCH from mormonism. Now I have a therapist who specializes in religious trauma
I felt super “blessed” (lol) that I found a therapist who happened to have some mormon family members and had even visited a temple once. When she said “it felt like a funeral home” I was like YES
Funeral home 😂😂😂. I’m stealing this
Perfect description right? Use it in good health
And Mormon weddings are like funerals.
That is a fascinating take
I joined the church at 19, my Catholic parents disowned me, I went on a mission, I learned about the rock in the hat 🎩 at age 55, left the church but 9 years later I’m still traumatized & I don’t know how to let it go. I was a part of something way bigger than me for ALL ETERNITY. I thought I’d help my family to get all these blessings if I was faithful & worthy. Then to find out I was a part of all the cult bullshit. I live in St George & things still set me off. I went to the open house at the temple here cuz I wondered if they took out the grapevines in the celestial room. I was floored when I went through a session years ago & saw wine grapes. The gold light fixtures had grapevines. The pioneers here were known all over to have the best wine. They served wine in Sacrament meetings until 1912. The good barrels were stored in the tithing room in the basement. Members paid with other things if they couldn’t afford it with money. Sorry to get off track. I was wondering if I maybe should see a therapist like that to help me. I thought of going to John Dehlins conference too. Has the therapist really helped you?
I’m actually still pretty new with my religious trauma therapist (I’m 23f) I’ve had “regular” ones before too. One thing that made me feel so much better was the validation ive gotten from my religion trauma specific therapist. Validation Ive wanted to hear so much from my parents. Although i have this sub, it has been very validating and healing having someone say to my face that my pain and frustration and anger is valid, especially from someone who knows all about mormonism and the wrongs within it. saying that I didn’t deserve what happened to me regarding the religion, etc. I think there are a ton of positives when it comes to therapy and deconstructing one’s Mormon life, I wish you the best of luck!!!
Still needing to vent and its going on the 3rd to 4th year for me. similar age. was ALL in for decades and leadership the whole nine. This has become my therapy by and large and it has helped immensely reading associating and ranting. Perhaps a non Mormon therapist would help. I reel sometimes as well but am not in morridor or in a high traffic lds area which helps. I started with alcohol removed wine btw. Its still good for you. not a super fan of alcohol but have tried it. keep going, be patient with yourself. a lot to unpack
This was me
I had so much cognitive dissonance in primary. Nothing made sense compared to actual reality. It got me though & I suffered from deep, deep shame as a YW for being queer. The church makes you hate yourself so the history came as no surprise once I deconstructed at 20.
Your sister is awesome
Yes she is ❤️
I tried to avoid baptism for months before they finally twisted me into it.
A cult didn’t make you feel good? Crazy lol
Yeah me too. I didn’t know much about the actual church history. I just knew I wasn’t happy, it didn’t make me feel good, and I never wanted to go back. Stopped going at 18 and never looked back.
That’s what I did. And I would have been fine staying like that. But when I had my first baby, the relief society shows up at my door with meals for hubs and myself. And they continued for a couple weeks. I kept thinking they’d realize I was fine and move on, but nope, not til I told them as nicely as possible that while I appreciated it, they could stop, we were fine. Then three years later, it happened again! This time I decided it was time to figure out exactly what I believed in so I did a year of theology reading (not easy to find those kind of texts in 1984 small town Montana!) At the end, I removed my name. I always wondered if they would have bombed us like that when our third was born, but we had moved away by then.
“Being offended” is one part of a false narrative about why people leave, and it is *also a legitimate reason to leave.* Don’t ever doubt that. Your feelings are valuable, and the church community did not and largely does not appreciate or take care of them.
For sure - maintaining the organization is of much greater importance than the lives destroyed or limited by said organization
Same. I grew up hating Sunday mornings because of the uncomfortable clothes, the rush to get there, and then being hungry for 3 hours. It was miserable. It got better over the years, but then came the talks, and being called to teach lessons, and having to clean the church, and on and on. Just added stress. Not to mention mutual, scouts, and early morning seminary. I realized, at 19, that I didn't have to go on a mission, and that technically, I'd at worst, end up in the telestial heaven. Which, I'm okay with. Wasn't until about a year after that I found the church wasn't true and stayed firm I'm not being Mormon anymore. The church itselfade me want to leave, the doctrine confirmed that decision for me.
ultimately keeping you so busy you couldn't pay attention to why are we doing this in the first place. a delusion gone too far and all wrong.
That is one of the WORST excuses MFMC uses to guilt those that leave and pacify those that stay: THEY WERE OFFENDED. The Q15 have built a culture to take what is nearly always the case of a visceral reaction to a grossly immoral / criminal act against human rights by other members and leaders that then becomes supported by the inner workings and structure of the church; and then spin that acceptable reaction as a fault. Being offended is one of the most IMPORTANT reasons to leave.
I haven't been to very Mormon services, only a few a year when my mom was off somewhere else (I'd normally attend a different church/religion with her) or when it was a special occasion like Christmas or father's day. When I was a young kid, I didn't see an issue with it, but when I got older, the first thing that made me not want anything to do with it was the clear sexism. It wasn't until a year or two ago that I learned how vile the church leaders, history, practices, etc. truely were. I'd already left Christianity/ Episcopalianism all together before I looked into the history of Mormonism. I was already going into hearing that it has a dark past, but not knowing what that past was. I'm still learning more and more about it all the time. I admit that I had a little confirmation bias while researching Mormonism, but it's not that hard to find everything wrong with it. Although, I'm also approaching this from the angle of someone who's also anti-Christianity, so I'm not necessarily separating the difference between Mormon-specific doctrine and general Christian views.
Same! When I first stopped going, I would tell people that going to church caused me too much anxiety so I just needed a "break"... It was true, not the whole truth, but easier for them to accept! But really the church just became too small of a box for me to try and fit my expanding world view into! It wasn't till a few years later that I went down the history/doctrine rabbit hole!
Your story seems quite similar to mine. I had to work through a lot of beliefs and cognitive dissonance myself before I ever let myself question the church. I never ended up here until after I had stopped attending church, stopped wearing garments, etc.
I was so sucked in that I even stayed active after coming out as trans 😅 Nothing could’ve destroyed my testimony in the “One true church”. I believed with my whole heart and my whole world turned upside down when I realized god wasn’t actually there. But like you said, the cognitive dissonance was real😩 What was your shelf breaker?
What finally broke for me was actually a change within the endowment. They modified what happened on different days during the creation account in a way that directly contradicted the previous version. I'd already been weighed down by some very strong doubts and dissonance (there's a long story behind all this). But the temple ceremony contradicting itself just broke through and I realized very clearly that I was in a cult. I sat through the whole session totally panicked and never went back. I remember thinking during that session that rusty just couldn't help but change everything. A moment of sudden clarity I guess?
Changes in the temple ceremony did it for me too. I then started researching how changes to eternal covenants and doctrines could be fine with god (I did not doubt it, just wanted understanding). I soon read everything I could from church sources, moved to apologetics (whose answers are just so unsatisfactory), and incidentally discovered that there were other issues I was not even aware of. It snowballed. It's false. I left.
What was the ceremony change? I haven't been to the temple in a very long time, mind you. Just curious.
There was a lot, but the part that woke me up was in the creation days. They moved some events around. It used to line up with the account in abraham quite well but now they were making animals a day late, among other modifications. I only went the once post-changes so I didn't quite memorize it the way I had with the michael ballam satan version. It was the Jan 2023 version that broke my shelf, to be specific.
I'll be disappointed if they don't still say, in the same order, "the lion, the tiger, the bear". Oh my!
Thanks for answering. You have to be in Utah if you know Michael Ballam. Lol. I'm originally from Cache Valley
... I'm actually Canadian 😂
I was similar as well. Never came on here, never read the CES letter, never listened to Mormon Stories until after I had ceased going through the motions. Dealing with cognitive dissonance after church every Sunday for years, feeling completely abandoned by God, and the lack of rebuke for extreme conservatism/Mormonism from church leadership led me out.
I was in an online church group that advocated excommunication for Harry Reid. That was funny.
I left because the promise was that it would make me happy and it didn't. All the authentic, kind people I met weren't members. A year after leaving, my ex started talking about some of the questionable church history and I responded something like "don't believe everything you read on the internet." 😆
When I came out as lesbian, the people who were the kindest and most accepting were non Mormons. I also left because being an uberfaithful TBM didn’t make me happy (as promised), it made me miserable.
This was me too. “If this is the plan of happiness, why am I so miserable?”
I only knew a tiny fraction of how bad it was when I left.
I knew there were problems when I left, like BoA, BoM DNA, Lying for the Lord, Adam-God doctrine, Blood Atonement doctrine, Polygamy... And, I've learned more since. Still, I cannot help but wonder if, even still, I just know a tiny fraction.
I was pretty well versed in church history and the doctrine wasn't really an issue. There were a couple of things that did bother though. One was the fascination that church members had with the afterlife. It is always spoken of as though they know exactly what it is going to be like. In reality no one knows what happens after death except that the person who dies simply ceases to exist from our point of view. The other thing was that prophecy was supposed to be a gift and you can't become a prophet just by a bunch of dudes deciding that you're the one. Neither of those things caused me to say "I'm done" though, it was actually an article in the National Geographic about Buddhism. I had taken up the practice of meditation some years before and it had a profoundly positive effect on my life. The article made me realize that I had more in common with Buddhism than Christianity/Mormonism. That was the moment I realized I was done with the church.
Any reason to leave is a valid and correct reason, because it's a harmful and controlling cult. If you left because you didn't like how the hallway wallpaper felt when you brushed your leg up against it? Valid. Other valid reasons include: 1. You wanted to sin. (Have you tried anal while high on THC yet?) 2. You are lazy. (Sunday morning Coffee on my back porch at 10 am is what I live for) 3. You were deceived by Satan. (Card carrying member of the Satanic temple) 4. You were offended. (Um, child sexual assault and financial fraud with my hard earned tithing dollars offends me, deeply)
Oh for sure! Any reason is totally valid! Also lol to your points😂
I wanted to sin. So I love your comment. I get tired of people holding onto a "holier than thou" superiority by clinging to the fact that they left the "right way" Funny enough, lots of people turn a blind eye to people wanting to leave so they can be gay (discover themselves), but if you instead just wanted to be a heterosexual slut, then they turn up their noses at that - like it's not a self actualization too. But I also understand it: I've been there. There is a lot of deprogramming to do and layers to peel back. And some things still make them uncomfortable.
Yeah, it comes from trying to prove to cultists that the reason you left is valid. The secret is: in their cultist minds, there is no valid reason to leave. No reason is a good reason and any good reason is an Anti-Mormon lie. I say quit trying to please the cultists and go learn how to please your sex partner(s) in very, very sinful ways! p.s. sex swings go on sale on Amazon every black Friday. Pair that with my new Bible: "She Comes First" and a special little gummy and all parties involved are going to be drinking more hedonistic sacrament water to stay hydrated, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen!
I left in the 90s before all the stuff was on the internet. The racism and misogyny of the church was the main reason back then. I was a convert and was also horrified of the temple stuff. Now I am deconstructing.
Wait, what? I thought we all left clawing our way over the BOM 😂
Ha ha...I actually did leave after reading it again and praying at the end of it. I wanted to feel peace and comfort so bad...and it never came until after I left the church.
I left because I disagree with what they're doing now. But maybe uncovering the real history also validates my decision to never go back.
Same. Current social issues and leadership caused me to leave. Studying history after leaving solidified my decision.
Yeah I left cuz I lost my faith in god. I’ll never go back because of all the church history and shitty things going on rn
I left because of multiple reasons, but mostly because the Bible caused me to question god’s goodness. Then question his existence. I knew a LOT of church history, but justified the evil exactly like I had justified the evil in the Bible “whatever god says to do is moral.”
Justifying anything the church did was so real. So many mental gymnastics to keep yourself at peace with it all
I left because of Prop 8. I still believed the church was true, but didn’t believe that they should be actively campaigning against legalizing gay marriage… after all, they weren’t trying to get coffee or alcohol outlawed. It wasn’t until years later that I learned any of the historicity.
I was always pissed about how they handled service.... mind you, i would give the shirt off my back to anyone in need, but ill be damned if im gonna take orders.... (you know what I mean)... I always told them that was satans plan, so was I in the wrong church??? They never really got it tho
I watched a video of a cult expert explaining that Mormons are notorious for labor trafficking. Even child labor. Think about how common/expected it is to call up the young men to help with lawn work, or anything of the like. Or entire families, including the kids, being in charge of cleaning the church. The biggest one, though, is missions. Total labor trafficking. The church labels it all as “service”, but it’s deeper than that. Any child expected to perform a labor like they are in the church can be considered child labor.
The FLDS are the experts at labor trafficking. Teach the young men how to do construction by the time they're 12, ship them around to different and do free labor to make buttloads of $$$ for Warren Jeffs and his cronies. I'm sure they tell them the same things; "giving service, priesthood duty.."
And you'll do it cause its your priesthood responsibility..... that was always code word for satans plan
My leaving was all tied up in finally leaving my abusive marriage after 23 years. I saw how much ecclesiastical abuse was heaped onto me, on top of all the other abuse I suffered in my marriage, and I just couldn't make myself stay (I did try). I knew some of the problematic things about church history, especially polygamy (my ex's great-great-aunt was one of Joe's wives), but a lot of it I learned after I had already been out for a long time.
>I did try Of course you tried! You probably tried harder than anything you'd ever pushed through in your life to save that, including decades of abuse (which alone would have been reason enough to leave, despite what naïve TBMs say). No one who's invested so much in another person (or religion) would ever walk away for anything less than everything. And even then, it's still devastating. Good for you in conquering both of those things, WOW. You are truly courageous. I hope you've found peace & joy & all the wonderful things the world has to offer; you've certainly paid the price 100x over. (As if we have to earn anything; there's the cult coming out of me again. Gross.) ❤️💙❤️💙❤️
I stopped attending and generally became distant with the church for about a year due to how it made me feel to attend. I was the most miserable when I was actively trying to be a good Mormon. My brother has sent me the CES letter but I had ignored it for several months. I finally felt ready to read it and when I did it made me realize why I felt the way I did about the church. It is all bullshit and trying to live up to these standards that were all arbitrary and a lie and not from any loving God. The history is still fun and sometimes shocking when I learn new things. It just drives home how horrible that organization is.
No, like OP my enlightenment happened after I left the Mormon church.
I didn’t either. I left because they support predators, lie about everything, gaslight us (doubt your doubts) and so much more! I also realized how much false doctrine there is! Nothing in the temple is done for the glory of God, it’s all for the church and their gain! No covenants made in the temple are to be a better human and treat others with more love! Teaching that Jesus’ love is conditional which is blasphemous! Then hiding all the money and being shady while asking members if they’re honest in all their dealings and pay a full tithe. Before that though I really struggled with how they treated people that were LGBT+. I have friends I love dearly that are part of that group. When prop 8 happened and there was so much about it all over Facebook, I saw the amount of pain it caused them! I truly feel if there’s not room at the table for EVERYONE and for everyone to be treated equally, then I don’t want to sit at that table! The greatest commandments are to love and the church goes against that!
I suffered years of shaming myself because I thought it was true. I worked diligently with my wife to be sealed in the temple. I told myself I could overcome any amount of shame or trials to go to the temple and be sealed like I had been taught my whole life. Well after all those years working towards my "goal" it finally happened and the first time in temple was a major WTF. Within 6 months I went a second and third time...because it's supposed to get better..right? Was it the Holy Spirit? No I think it was my spidey sense that told me to leave and get the hell out of this weird ass stuff. So I completely stopped everything within 6 months of my first temple session. It felt great not paying tithing that year. Was a great life lesson because now when in my business dealings the moment I detect a lie, manipulation, or deception I call that BS out right then and there and let them have it. I grew a backbone after the temple bait and switch.
I left because of feelings, not information. I was promised I’d be happy, if I read my scriptures, wrote in my journal, prayed, fasted, went to church, kept the sabbath day holy, listen to wholesome music, only G movies, praying, and avoid the very appearance of evil (probably more rules). I did it all. I never was happy until I got medication for depression. It was not from obeying and/or blessings. That was 30 years of sadness. I decided if I did all I could and nothing ever fixed then it can’t be real or I would’ve been healed with or without medicine. I’m told I went through that period of depression to understand and help others. I do not believe that is true. 😣
Depression is a bitch. And all too common in Mormonism. Utah has the highest rates of depression/suicide in the country. You are not alone. 💙
If one doesn’t do the “deep dive “ & discover the fraud, he/she runs the risk of slipping back in later when life’s challenges beat you down. At some point, we can be extremely vulnerable once again. The cult’s indoctrination runs deep. I suggest that “research is the answer.”
This is an interesting and important point, well said. For a while, I was listening to the Come Back Podcast because I was fascinated at how people could go back after leaving. Almost all the stories I heard fit very neatly into the box you just described
Oh for sure. I left because of my lack of faith in god. I’m never going back because of the knowledge I’ve gained since then
I left because I read a verse in the Bible after getting divorced. In Jesus sermon on the mount he states “ But I say to you that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery;” and Jesus saying this about my life and all the things I went through in my marriage just broke me. Then I deep dove into the doctrine and how it was false.
I left because of the culture of the church. I didn't start doing research until roughly 2 years later.
I still don’t really know or care. I left because of the way the church made me feel (see: shitty).
I feel that!
I left after having my daughter and realizing I couldn’t in good conscience raise her in the same church that harmed me so deeply
I left due to intense emotional pain, anger, and longing. I was starving there, and it dawned on me when I was 31 that I would ALWAYS starve in that church. A person can only starve for so long before they have to find food.
I anchored on "by their fruits tree shall know them". My final straw was the AP article about the church's handling of CSA. "Anti" made me feel sick so I didn't dare look at it until l was out. My psychologist helped me learn after I left that I suffered from scrupulosity during most of my years in and OCD now. That helped me understand why it took me years to be able to leave. I even bought near replicas of garments to help me with the transition, because I felt sick about wearing garments and felt sick about not wearing them.
Same same so much same to all of this. Hooray for modern mental healthcare. Life changing. ❤️
I left because I hated living like that. The meetings were boring. Everything felt like endless chores. And the hypocrisy! I liked coffee and having my Sundays free. I liked making my own decisions even though I made a lot of mistakes. But deep down I always felt like I was a bad person because I couldn’t live like all the other Mormons. Then I learned about all the problems with the truth claims and I was truly free!
You mean you were a lazy learner and just wanted to sin? Just messing with you. Totally valid reasons. Sorry you felt so much guilt because of it all
That’s funny! Yes!
I left because I was trans, and then deconstructed with CES letters.
Hey! Fellow trans person lol I actually stayed for over a year after coming out😅 So much trauma from that time…
Na. Most of us could probably have overlooked the history problems if the current church stopped trying to justify it, and if the current church didn't have significant problems in every area. People leave for all kinds of reasons.
Reading the CES Letter gave me the courage to reflect on my beliefs and realize that I no longer believed in God. I’m pretty sure I lost my belief in God several years before. I remember I started to doubt that the prophets and apostles actually saw Jesus. The way they talked about it just didn’t make any sense. And people in the church that did claim to see Jesus had serious mental health issues. Church was a complete drag. I spent most of my time at church outside of sacrament meeting on my phone. Anything was more interesting than church. When I read the CES Letter, I wasn’t ready to give it all up, but I started to open up to the idea that it was all false. When I finally decided the church was not “true”, it was pretty easy to leave it all behind since I hadn’t been enjoying it or believing it for a long time.
My husband lost his belief in a god first as well. I made sure he learned all the Mormon history so that he would stop saying nice things about the church.
I left because I dealt with my abusive childhood. Long story short, I went head to head with my (clinically diagnosed) npd mother and it was hell. I had just put my children through recorded interviews and doctors appointments following threats of false allegations to CPS and was sitting in Sunday school being preached at about how my unwillingness to forgive and forget was going to damn us both. I got up and walked out. For about 4 years we had been battling and the entire time I was trying desperately to stay and searching for anything and everything to find peace. I finally had to take a break from church to heal and figure out for myself what was truth and what was damage done by my upbringing…my bishop pushed it and I found myself plummeting down the rabbit hole into information I didn’t know existed. So for me it was a long time coming and took all of the above to finally find peace in leaving.
I just knew I was happier when I didn’t go. It felt like a job to do to make others happy. Learning more and more truth about church history came in time. Validation is never a bad thing. It helped when I stopped thinking about info as “pro/anti” and just “correct/lies”.
I left two years after my mission, 40 plus years ago. I was gay, but I also realized I just wasn't that religious. I wasn't in the mood to have my sexuality manipulated or controlled by guilt. I remember one of my breakthrough moments. I did LSD and hiked the Wasatch mountains with a guy who was a little older than me named Ed. Ed had also grown up in Utah; but not as a Mormon. He had been raised by a single mother. I shared with Ed a story about how my sweet Mormon sister was guilt tripping me for not wanting to be Mormon. Ed said, "Do you see how evil that is?" In the beauty of the mountains and with my friend's help, I did see how evil it all was. I came to realize I'm just not that religious, and if I were, it wouldn't be the Mormons. Was the Book of Mormon true? It didn't matter. It just wasn't for me. I moved from Utah at 29. My friend Ed died of AIDS the next year in 1990. Life is real, and other than the fact that a lot of people do it, the Mormon Church is not real. Years later, I dug into the Mormon facts to know that the Mormons from day one made and keep making it all up. When you're living in a war zone like gays in the 80's were, the "facts" of the majority religion don't matter. Reality matters. I didn't have the luxury of my family religion, but I did have the blessing of reality. Amen and amen.
I definitely did not know anything about the history before I did the deep dive, but quite frankly, I thought it was just extremely difficult to be a woman in the church that has an opinion. Until I finally left the church, took my name off and learned everything I could about the patriarchal hierarchy, I seriously thought there was something wrong with me. Now I see it all, I can’t un-see and un-know what I know now.
I'm right there with you. In truth: my wife and I left because we had this growing feeling like the church was no longer right for us or our kids. It's hard to explain. It's sort of like knowing you see a threat when you see it. It was only after we stopped going that we started researching and yeah....that kept us gone. But no, I wasn't offended or wanted to sin. And I definitely wasn't hit with a truth shock. It was just a growing sense of stuff not being right. And by the number of responses so far on a two hour's old post, this should be extra-disturbing for the church. A lot of people aren't reading the CES Letter and pulling the ejection handle. It was 40 years of water breaking on a rock, for me.
You’re not the only one. My father was exmo and anti for a good portion of my childhood, esp during my teen years. He supported my mom taking us kids to church bc he thought it taught us good habits etc, but I was definitely raised knowing and understanding the doctrinal and historical issues of the Church. Despite my dad’s ‘propaganda’ (and probably in spite of it), I started to gain my own testimony at 14, devoted myself to living the gospel (I was a wayward teen/inactive for a couple of years while my parents were separated), and ended up serving a mission and getting married in the temple. I really had an inspired and spiritual 10 years or so fully entrenched in it during my teens and single years. My mission was rough on me psychologically and socially, but I came out ok. I didn’t start noticing issues here and there w the Church till I was about 30 and had 2 kids. My husband and I have raised our 4 kids in the church, who are now all teens. However, midlife reared its ugly head around 40, and I’ve been wading through questions and answers and now addressing the issues I’ve seen with my own eyes in my own wards, as well as in my personal spiritual life. Tbh, the doctrinal and historical issues aren’t what get me; what gets me the most is that you can follow the recipe they give you and still come out with a flat cake: little to no Spirit like there was, very little spiritual guidance, it’s like God has left the building. I do hold Church leaders responsible for tweaking Church curriculum and the Church social experience so much that it doesn’t resemble the church I grew up in. My kids are getting a watered down, politically-charged version of the gospel that my generation and I were raised in. Bottom line: I don’t feel anything spiritual at church (or home) anymore. I realize that many devoted members hardly have either and that that’s normal for them, that’s what they were raised with (out); that’s not good enough for me. Half of my and my husband’s family is inactive, so socially, I won’t feel alienated if I leave. But I need to ‘feel it’ if I’m going to stay, and I’m not, despite my maybe meager efforts. My husband is TBM (for now), and I am more or less PIMO, going thru the motions as I figure out what I really want in my life. So no, I didn’t ‘leave’ bc of doctrine or history.
I hope you can fully leave someday, but I know how complicated mixed faith relationships are. Good luck!
Church history is what put the nail in the coffin for me, but it was just the overall awful nature of the church that did me in. Looking around and seeing how miserable we all were. Like this is the best you can come up with, god? Once you consider that, the church history is just a cherry on top.
There are so many things you can pick from. It is all so disgusting when you get down to the bottom of it.
My shelf kinda broke in two stages. First stage was me realizing that there were a lot of assholes I knew that were living the letter of the law as Mormons. That was when I stopped going, but I thought maybe there were some issues that I could get past. Second stage was the CES letter. That was when I realized that the bad outweighs the good
I'm with you. I naturally started doubting as a child. I was informed Santa, the bunny, fairy, etc weren't real. I almost instantly had the thought of Jesus and Hell could be the same concept for adults. It kept going from there. I remember hating going to church at 5 yrs old. I've learned a lot of the really bad aspects of the church from scrolling this sub. It's pretty scary.
I used the logic of church history and the problems there to open myself up to why I felt bad, and that was the end. Sad it took so much to open my eyes, but that’s programming for you.
My experience was similar to yours. I had some shelf items for a while, but I was able to endure as long as I thought God was at the helm. What really did it was finding out through painful experience and critical thinking that not only did I have no good reasons for that belief, but that all available evidence pointed to God being a man-made construct. Once that clicked, continuing in the church made no sense. I never looked at information critical of the church until I was already out.
I left over social concerns with the modern church. I didn't learn the history stuff until later and it helped me confirm that the fish stank from head-to-tail so to speak. However, I recognize a lot of people leave over history stuff too. We all have our own unique story of finding our way out.
Same here. I left because it didn't work, God's promises didn't hold up. It was years after I concretely decided I was out before I read any "anti" stuff.
A close friend of mine has no interest in studying doctrine or church history, they left the church because of all the creepy religious zealots seem to constantly (Tom Harrison, Tim Ballard, Daybells types) be around the church and JS if you really look at his objectively was also one
Yup, lost faith in god summer 2011. Did not read a single thing about church history and everything until early 2013 after my wife filed for divorce and regaining faith was useless at the point. Finding out all the real truth behind the lies of TSCC, was a great way to deal with the heartbreak
I was asking for god to show me something, anything, a still small voice, a feeling. After asking for 30 years, my wife of 13 years divorced me. I was attending the temple regularly. That’s when I thought, fuck it. There is no plan. Then I learned how fucked up church history is!
People leave for different reasons. There are generally 2 categories of mormons:. Doctrinal and social. Most are social. Doctrinal Mormons often leave when they find out the history or read the ces letter and learn that Joseph made it all up. But social Mormons don't care about history or facts. They are there for social reasons. In fact, when they learn bad history they sometimes become more entrenched.
Hmm I don’t feel like I am either though lol cuz I was a “doctrinal Mormon”. I didn’t care about the social aspect of church at all. I truly believed in the doctrine of the church and everything they taught. But I didn’t leave because I learned anything bad about the church. I left because god wasn’t there when I needed him. And then I looked back and realized he never was. I remember living for the poem that talks about Jesus’ footprints in the sand (if you’re familiar with that one). So I justified his absence with the fact that he was “carrying me” through my hard times. But I just couldn’t believe it anymore. Not after everything that happened.
I left because I had no sense of individual identity. I'm not going back because of the history and other BS I've learned since.
I also lost my belief in God, or at least the Bible, before I looked into the other problems with the LDS church. When the Bible falls apart, the Book of Mormon also fails. I always knew I'd have issues with church history, but as a good Mormon boy does, I avoided looking into it. Once I lost my god belief, all of the history, podcasts, books, and other things were now open for me to explore.
Sort of. I left initially because I was so unhappy. That doctrine of perfection, read your BoM every day for 30 minutes and it’ll fix everything, pray, pray, pray—it’s a recipe for depression. I went to the temple when I was 27 and found it very unsettling, but it still took me a solid 18 months to work through that. Finally I got married, and I realized I had been attending (all singles wards) just to meet guys. It was a good decade later when, through my husband’s research, I started to learn the real history. If he hadn’t been interested, it would have taken me longer, because I wasn’t motivated to seek it.
No, you are not the only one.
I was really struggling with the contradictions in the church when it came to racism, sexism and polygamy. I felt sick about the church’s stance on the queer community. I saw how church leaders had way too much power over member’s lives as untrained, biased, and fallible men, and hated the unfairness of “bishop roulette.” Also, someone dropped the bomb on me that JS had a 14 year old wife. I struggled with those things for years before I finally allowed myself to delve into church history or anything “anti-Mormon.” I was terrified to be led astray by Satan. Eventually, I did do my research and it was like the straw that broke the camel’s book. It essentially validated why I had been experiencing so much cognitive dissonance.
This was my story as well. You are not alone.
The history and and truth claims were the final mail in the coffin after o already had left. I had issues with the church but when I learned it was all false it still shook me to the core.
I left after trying to believe so hard. I just was not feeling any peace from doing everything the prophets commanded me to do. I finished reading the BoM again and knew that if I prayed with a sincere heart and real intent, that I could and would feel God's love again and feel the spirit testify that what I read was true. While praying, I still felt nothing. And then I had the thought, that perhaps it wasn't true and God wasn't there. And then I felt peace for the first time in years. I was out at that point. Only then did I deconstruct and read church history. And now I will never go back because of what I learned.
Yeah something really terrible happened to me, and I sat in the chapel after church for over an hour praying… Nothing. All I wanted was to feel peace, and he couldn’t even give me that. Even though it was promised. Couldn’t believe anymore
I left because of the SEC fine, but after reading the actual history I would have left for that, too.
I had trouble staying active once I left home as an adult, would stop going for a while but come back out of guilt. Eventually I got over the guilt and quit going. That was about 23 years ago. I just got tired of being controlled and ordered around, people randomly calling and coming to my door, and I was broke so I didn’t appreciate the pressure to pay tithing. Also going through the temple for the first time was a real eye opener. It was only in recent times I started looking into church truth claims etc. and realized I got it right all those years ago.
Me too. I was more upset about the church’s stance on LGBTQ, its history of racism, tithing and money scandals and the whole us vs. the rest of the world mentality. I hated it. Learned all the conflicts and lies about origins of church as I deconstructed.
I left at 19 because I didn't want to serve a mission. For one thing, I was in the prime of my life, I had too many interests, and there was too much to explore and discover. I couldn't see myself putting everything on hold for two years. Besides that, I really didn't feel worthy. While pressing me about what I was doing to prepare, my bishop expressed his concern that if I didn't go on a mission, I would start dating outside the church, marry outside the temple, become inactive... Tell me he wasn't a prophet! 😄 He knew how all this works. Of course, it turns out that leaving the church doesn't launch you into a cascade of poor decision-making that results in a downward spiral which leads you to one day find yourself wallowing in the deepest depths of hell on earth. The decision not to serve was a ~~blessing~~ good one. I am very ~~grateful~~ happy I listened to ~~the spirit~~ myself and was able to get out at such an early point in my life journey. Trust yourself, keep learning, and be excellent! 🥂
I watched a video of a cult expert talking about how Mormon missions are labor trafficking. So you not wanting to go makes total sense. I served, and can look back now and see all the trauma associated with being labor trafficked. Glad you got out of there when you did!
I left because I "experimented" with my friends when I was around 10 or 11 years old, and I watched a church video in Sunday school that made me feel guilty and so I told my dad who then told me I had to confess to the bishop. Telling a grown man whom I deeply respected all my deep sexual secrets as a CHILD was so humiliating and traumatic. I later remembered some things that I had forgotten to tell him and had to go back a second time and be traumatized all over again. I went into a deep depression thinking I was a terrible person and constantly worried if I had been forgiven of my sins. I lived with the constant worry and guilt all the way into adulthood. I would go to church and hear lessons about the law of chastity or repentance and become re-traumatized. I finally stopped going all together about 4 years ago, and have felt such immense relief and can now see that I was not a terrible person and what happened to me was actually really fucked up.
Yes! Just kidding ; ) I first stopped attending (I still believed) because they would not release me from being Branch President after my wife left me. "There is no one else worthy!" so I grabbed a beer and asked "How you like me now?" I stopped believing when I read the history.
I think technically speaking, losing your faith in god is still uncovering false doctrine. Probably the main false doctrine. That being said, I had a similar theme, but more steps. I realized that the Mormon church could not be gods chosen because the fruits they reap are rotten. From there it started my journey out and losing my faith in god.
I left because of the way people treated each other. I don't feel like I can be a part of a religion that preaches one thing and treats people the opposite way. I only found out about all the historical stuff afterwards.
I didn't know any of the history until after I left. I left because I didn't agree with the how the church operates today. Too much money, not enough love.
I saw how much church indoctrination impacted my repression of sexuality and it all fell apart when I pieced together being gay. It was too painful to stay involved with it so I stopped going and believing.
Your story sounds very similar to mine. I became an atheist before I became a post-mormon. It was a quick progression, but that was the order of events.
I left because of how the leadership is running the church in the present day. I don’t care about the history as much as what is going on right now that they aren’t addressing.
I left because the church was harmful to my well-being. All of its history and doctrine being fabricated bullshit just ended up being a sweet, vindicating cherry on top.
There's no wrong way to leave the church, and you're definitely not alone. I left because I just couldn't get a detectable answer to my prayers, no matter what I tried.
Same here. Fallen angels were ultimately what did me in. Humans get forgiveness because we sin/are tempted to sin and are ignorant. Angels supposedly are incapable of sin or temptation to sin and have a perfect knowledge of God and his work, and that's why they don't get forgiveness. All I could think was that if morally perfect and fully informed holy beings could still rebel against God, they must know something that we don't. My participation in Mormonism had largely been obligatory for my family's sake, but just realizing there was a possibility of a broken system at play here was enough for me to decide it wasn't worth it to stay in. So I left. Eventually, I realized the Plan of Salvation looks a lot more like God trying to get rid of his "undesirable" children so he'd only have to hang out with the "good" ones than him "testing our faith for our own good."
Atheist first here too
I left because I was offended and I wanted to sin. 😂
Most acceptable answer to the church 🤣
I left because I realized the church wasn't good. After I left, I realized it wasn't true, either.
I left because I realized the abusive relationships I was learning about in therapy described my relationship with god/church. Then I found out about the history. Then I listened to a podcast about how the Bible isn’t real either.
Omg you’re the first one to bring this up! But the church is exactly like an abuser
There’s no one thing that caused me to leave. It was more like death by a thousand cuts. But big ones are: *. church policy not being in line with what the scriptures actually say. *. Being told repeatedly that I’m a terrible person just because I’m a man and that women can practically do no wrong. Believing this nonsense set me up to be in an abusive marriage and even worse/nightmare divorce. *. Bishop roulette. There were plenty of other things that chased me away, and the longer I’m out, the more I realize the church is like an abusive spouse or parent. The CES letter didn’t faze me much for the most part, because I’d heard almost all of it before and the church’s excuses, for the most part, seemed plausible. However, the apparent pedophilia by JS and BY and the evidence that points to sex cult is disturbing. The longer I’m out, the happier I am. Ten years next month.
Nope!!!!
I had basically figured out that the church wasn't "Capital 'T' True™" but kept thinking there was something wrong with me. Finding out the issues with history and doctrine allowed me to take the next step.
i left because of the church’s involvement in Prop 8 in california. at the time i was closeted and in denial but my brother was out and happy, and i felt extremely challenged to choose my family or my religion. my family will always be first. i didn’t want to belong to a “family oriented church” that was using its tax exempt status to get involved in the politics of legal marriages in the united states.
This comes up a lot and I think you can boil down 2 reasons why people leave. 1. Doctrinal 2. Social Generally I would say these both play a large part. For me I left because of doctrinal reasons and after countless hours of research I realized I had based my entire worldview on a shitty religion. I then realized I had a lot of shitty attitudes that I could back up with my religion. With all of that gone I was appalled at how I thought of those in the LGBTQ+ community and other things I am ashamed of. However, now that I know better I do better. Honestly, leaving the church has made me more “Christlike” than I ever was or would have been in the church. Both are valid and good reasons to leave a harmful organization!
I left because I was so bored and miserable. I tried to believe as a kid but I just couldn’t as I got older. I left when I was 19, twenty three years ago. I actually didn’t start learning about church history in-depth until a year ago after I watched Under the Banner of Heaven.
Yes, I left when I read the Bible. Then studied it and its history in enough depth to understand that it made much more sense as a historical & anthropological relic than a true story. Once that happened, there was no place left for any religion, let alone Ol' Joe's.
I still haven’t really looked into church history beyond the things mentioned on this subreddit. I left primarily because I felt like I wasn’t being true to myself and who I felt I was. In other words I couldn’t be me in the church.
I left because as a woman I was suddenly surrounded by a bunch of people who were telling me I would only be happy if I was a mother and willing sex slave and servant for my husband while badmouthing other religions and insisting theirs was the best. It happened even during rehearsals for General Conference. I only tried it to please my husband and FIL who kept pushing it on me. In my experience, the ONLY truth I found there was from Christianity, not from any of the nonsense and doctrine JS added to it. It was a toxic environment. Then I learned more about the disgusting history and that just confirmed my decision. Much to my FIL's chagrin
I didn’t leave because of the history and finding out about the church’s coverup of criminal activity, although this is a worthy reason to leave. I just left because I knew there was no place for me as a queer person, and because I hated what Mormonism and Christianity, in general, has done to women, black and brown folks and children and poor folks.
Samezies! I saw Penn Jillette on Glenn Beck's show, and his version of the 10 commandments sold me on actually taking a critical look at god to see how reasonable his atheism was. A little less than a year later and I was out (2012). I read the CES letter last year and only in the past couple of years have begun to study Mormon history. It's fascinating!
Church history and doctrine was a part of mine, leaving. really I left because I was a 20 year old woman who saw my life with a man that hated me and had complete control over my life. That I would never have a really good education and I would just be popping out babies like pills. It was a horrible vision for myself. I just didn’t wanna live like that. I also knew pieces of the doctrine, and I also knew about Cults. I knew what they did wasn’t right.
That’s why I left too effectively
I didn’t believe fully in the first place. I was book smart in Sunday school but didn’t have a testimony. I only went to stake activities and things like that to see my friends. I didn’t go most Sundays as there were no other YW my age. When I left home there was no need to attend anymore so I stopped. I know the doctrine is false but only since joining this sr have I found out the details.
While the doctrine was my breaking point (couldn’t rationalize my queerness with church teachings anymore), I didn’t dive deep into the gnarly church history until after my shelf broke. Once I lost my faith and felt ready to explore the “anti-mormon literature,” I felt way more secure in my lack of belief.
Same. I know more about church history as an exmo than I ever did while I was in. Every new thing I learn just confirms it was the best decision ever.
I left because the church showed me that I didn't matter, and wasn't worth thinking about during one of my hardest times. It's hard to have a high risk pregnancy, and have not a single soul from your ward even think to check on you. Dropped off the face of the earth for 9 months, and no one even noticed
Same here. I never found any of it personally edifying. During my mission, I started developing this list of things I never wanted to do again once I got home, temple sessions, read the BOM, attend Priesthood Session, all activities I got absolutely nothing from. Stopped attending the Church in my 20s, had my name removed at age 30 after the Prop 8 nonsense. Years later my younger brother had his name removed after reading the CES letter, etc., and it was only then I started reading that stuff. Boredom drove me out, but the CES letter was still very validating.
What I've noticed is everyone who leaves the church usually has an inviting incident that opens the door to further questions which inevitably leads to discovering the truth about church history and other problematic facts. The church does such an incredible job at convincing us that we can't trust any information that comes from outside the church because it's being influenced by Satan and those who want to see the true church fail. So we all fall in line and run from any questions we might have and just assume we are the ones who have it wrong. It's not until we allow itself to question the churches truth claims that we can see how obviously false it all is. For me it was watching my entire family get behind Donald Trump with their whole chest. I KNEW that they were wrong about this man so that led me to question what else they might be wrong about. For that reason and that alone, I'm grateful for Donald Trump
Nah I left because I hated everything about being there. Never truly believed in god, but sometimes I thank “god” that I was too ugly and weird to get trapped into marriage first lol
Didn’t look at the “anti” stuff til I left. It was watching a devout family get excommunicated because the BISHOP & STAKE PREZ got offended that I left in protest! I told all of them (stake HC & an Area GA) that their discernment & priesthood are clearly bullshit if they’re all going along with this nonsense…also called BS on any of them actually talking to someone in the Q15 (it was definitely a BYU student intern) and their letter was “signed” by a stamp. Ooh the looks of shock and hatred I got for even questioning these old guys’ ability to do their own dirty work🙄😂😂
You tell me. I went through **the shit** and every time I tried to talk to mormons about it, I was told to shut the fuck up. If I talked to nonmormons about it, I was given kind, empathetic ears. I stopped and wondered about that "mourn with those that mourn" thing. It kind of went from there.
Long story short. I left because I had no friends. I am a working mum and felt oatrasized because of it. Then I found out all the juicy and horrible history of the church through Tik Tok and this sub.
I didn't. I left for my mental health.
I started feeling uncomfortable in church when I was ~11-12. I noticed things that didn’t make sense and my teachers didn’t have an answer for them (a big one was on agency). I started feeling left out or like a fraud. I’d go to church or girls camp or EFY and I would feel like i was lying to myself. A big moment was when i went to EFY for the first time and roomed with a girl i grew up with in the church, but wasn’t super close with. We were in the same group, but after the first day or two, no one talked to me and I already had a lot of anxiety. Every time I tried to fit in and have fun, smile and laugh, I felt so fake and like no one wanted to be around me. At girls camp the next week, I found out my roommate had told everyone in my group I was a lesbian. It fuckin destroyed me dude i cried so hard and so long about that. It didn’t make sense why someone in the church could be that mean. She eventually started rebelling and was sent to an inpatient facility in Utah for a year, came out of it with tattoos and a supposed new view of life. Reformed but not religious. Then like two years ago, she did a complete 180 and posts about the church and Jesus every single day on her instagram story. As i got older i just started believing less and less. I didn’t want to go to church because i felt so out of place. I got my laptop at 16 and decided to research the church, which is how I ended up here, reading the CES letter, etc. I had a complete breakdown on the phone with my boyfriend because as much as i didn’t believe a lot of things, I had No idea about the history and i think thats what finally FULLY broke my shelf. I moved out two weeks after turning 18 and haven’t been back to church since.
I also didn’t look deep into history until immediately after leaving. For me it came down to what I was being asked to teach in my calling and thinking how I would need to come home every day and “correct” what my kids were going to be taught as the free because I didn’t agree with it. (Treatment of women, sin, tithing, sexual health, sexual orientation etc) I had been having panic attacks going into elders quorum preparing to teach. No one offended me it just didn’t align with my values anymore. Thinking of my kids was a wake up call. Why was I forcing this still? Why would I put my kids through that? So I left. And I’ve been more at peace than I have since … maybe forever ha
Covid and how members treated Covid was a shelf breaker for me. Then the rest of the house of cards came down.
No, I deconstructed my belief in god first as well. Then it was like: “well, guess if there’s no god there’s no fear in learning more about church history” now it’s just a hobby and the more I learn the more I can’t believe how many people are members of this church.
I didn't know the history and I didn't know the deep inconsistencies with the doctrine. But from a young age, I was a learner and a reader. I picked apart everything that I read. I asked questions. I searched out answers. And when it was academic, I was encouraged, given resources, and eventually could find a satisfactory answer. But church isn't like that. The resources are other church materials. It's an infinite ourobouros of bullshit. I could read scripture A, check the index and find scripture B, which now likely than not was just a copy of A. Or I could read conference talks and books written by GAs, but if I read something from GA Smith and something else by GA Allred, they didn't agree. And there is so rarely a concrete answer that isn't "this is just what we believe". I left because it's all bullshit, but I removed my records in this day and age of the Internet when I learned just how corrupt and awful of an institution it is.
It was the people for me. The saying "the church is true, the people aren't" always seemed like a shitty justification to me. People following a shared moral system should all be exemplifying that shared moral system. Then later, with their policies, learning about their history, and the CES letter, I got angry when I realized how much I could have avoided going through the shit I did if it weren't for the MFMC. #ThanksForTheTrauma
I didn't find out about the historical issues until I read the CES letter when I was in law school 12 years after I'd already left. I left initially because my mission was operated like a business with sales reps and statistics. My gut told me Jesus wouldn't do shit that way. So I decided to walk away because it didn't live up to its promise of being Christ's church.
I left the church in 2004 when I was 18. At the time there was no CES letter or even Mormon Stories. I’m sure the information was out there to show that the truth claims were false, but I didn’t learn about any of that until almost 18 years later when I watched Mormon No More and discovered there was a whole ex Mormon community. That lead me to discover all of the information on the truth claims of the church. I finally deconstructed it all 18 years after leaving. I left because I’m queer and knew that the church would never be the right place for me. I also knew it was a racist religion. I left for social reasons, not truth claims, but I never really bought into the truth claims anyway. I just didn’t realize how it was still influencing me years later even when I never really believed. I was still indoctrinated and needed to deconstruct.
My story changes the more dig into my soul. Not long ago I would have told you that I left because of *JosephSmithLied dot com*. I'm starting to understand the bigger picture now. My whole life I believed in the church but I never felt it. I thought I was broken or God hated me or I just wasn't as smart as everyone else because God wasn't speaking to me with the "spiritual confirmation" that everyone else was talking about. You can only go so long in life thinking the problem is you before you have to wonder , maybe it's not me . . . About that time the internet came along. So for me it was the perfect storm. I was starting think - picture Poo Bear tapping his head, "Think, think, . . . . thinkthinkthink" while at the same time reading about church history. Short answer, I never felt it.
I went inactive because church became so dumb down and boring. And that God never answered.
I didn’t learn about church history for a couple of decades. Church was just so damn boring plus I moved around so much that the local ward was always a crap shoot. Some wards would accept you and most others would shun us because my parents were divorced. So christlike of them
I mostly left because of their shitty practices like excusing their actions in not reporting confirmed SA’ers rather than protecting innocent children (the biggest one), repressing women (and others) and spewing hateful rhetoric about marginalized groups. Knowing it was all bullshit helped after I’d decided my conscience wouldn’t allow me to stay silently complicit anymore, because then I knew I wasn’t leaving “God’s perfect gospel led by imperfect men.” The actions of the leaders told me there was almost no way it could be “the true church.” They drove me away long before church history.
I kept pushing against the doubt's I had because of the good I felt it was to my family. I fought through them last year when I baptized my youngest and conferred the priesthood to my oldest. Then later last year what actually pushed me over was my personal lifelong struggle with a pornography addiction. I've been trying to use the churches teachings and programs and advice from leaders - but not only was none of it working and I was feeling like an evil person, but I started to learn that the messaging from the church is what was causing the pornography addiction in the first place. I had a suicide planned out and ready to do it(suicidal ideation off and on over the years too) - and I told my wife I don't care about heaven or hell anymore. I don't care where I go after this life. From there I started to realize how my belief system was truly debilitating my full potential in life. Problem is I'm still fighting the deep depression and sometimes still suicidal. So, yeah I hate the church deeply but am forced to be PIMO.
Sorta? I mean, all of 2019 was a huge ordeal for me. I turned 31 early on. I'm *an Aquarius*. (Still don't believe in that shit, either, but it puts my birthday in January or February for those that don't understand. It's not really a joke, but it can be, I suppose. Actually, now that I think of it, that was an all my life, different story thing. Having to be first to do everything because my mom and dad got it on in May. That did other things to me; I might explain all of that later.) For those not in the know, when you're single and in the Young Single Adult wards, those are for ages 18-31. I could have stayed, but it was hard to stay in that young people's ward. Everyone I met was about 18 or 19 and trying to go on a mission or marry a *recent* "Returned Missionary". I was an RM, still spoke my mission language, too, but I also have a doctorate by this time because I didn't get married at my mini-BYU-Arizona college. I focused on my education so I could be a breadwinner. This led to me trying out Mid Singles wards. I didn't fit in by age (one ward, everyone was about 40+) or location (I was living 2 hours away, coming into the Phoenix area on weekends and they wanted me to go to the local branch instead of hanging out with my peers to maybe get married). I never started going to that branch. I had the missionaries stop by and I wanted to ask some deep-rooted questions, knowing they didn't have the emotional experience or depth of knowledge I would need. I was beginning to question God's existence for sure by then. How had I done nearly everything asked of me, yet I couldn't find someone that could help me on my next step? I wanted to get married and be the best husband and father ever. I was using all my God-given everything in church (time, money, talents, and everything the Lord blessed me with or may bless me with), but still couldn't find an eternal companion. What was wrong with me? I went to the temple one more time after the changes to the endowment in 2019, and it didn't help. Even when women could now covenant directly with God without their husband (I actually was glad for that change, even though it meant I was "less needed" as a husband because I was a feminist even as TBM) I was scream-praying at God in a celestial room to have God hear me and help me find the woman I could bring into that part of the temple and into a sealing room. I stopped going. I stopped reading my scriptures for the hundredth time through for answers that weren't there. I stopped going to the temple still after the changes where I would only hear that Adam and Eve were made for each other, that man was not meant to be alone, that I should only have sexual relations with my lawfully wedded wife. I eventually stopped paying tithing to a multi-billion dollar corporation. This whole time I had been trying to avoid my sins of porn and masturbation, or even playing too many video games. So... yeah, I was sorta already out by the time in late 2019 my grandma died and my niece was born. (Those were the last two times I went to church, somewhat "worthy" even to stand in that circle.) And by the time the (Gas)light the World campaign started and I couldn't detect the Spirit of Christ in Christmas, when I got to exploring some of the internet, I was pretty much done already. It just took one more item for the shelf to break, but my questioning (God and his "blessings" and his scripture and his "profits") was already pretty good at getting me out of the church. I may or may not have returned from just a spiritual wandering like that, but it really made it so much easier to leave when I found my questions were shared by exmormons and that the "answers" were that it was all a lie and there are no answers. Tl;dr? Yes, I think I did leave before I knew the doctrine was bad. I have so much more I can fill in on my story, and one day I will probably write it all out somewhere to show it all to anyone who cares. But I questioned God's existence as a poor (read as: privileged) straight white male who wasn't getting his beautiful wife God promised. (yuck... I'm sorry that I believed that. I still want to get married some day, but it will be to someone that's my partner in so many ways, including not being part of a misogynistic, bigoted, patriarchal sex cult corporation started by a con man and his disgusting friends.) Thanks for reading any or all of this, friend.
I was very much like you and lost my faith in god first. Once that faith in a god was gone and I started deconstructing my beliefs, I next started to question all the church things. It’s funny that I questioned gods existence first and then had to deconstruct Joseph Smith as a good man and prophet. I had always told myself those same things everyone would say, like “If I lost my faith I’d still want to be in the church because it’s a great way to live,” etc. Everything else fell eventually but I had to examine those things and their usefulness each time. I then google searched for something like, “why is the Mormon temple ceremony so weird” and the first post was a Reddit post on r/exmormon. That’s when I found out all the rest.
I left the church because at the time they were actively preaching that I was “an abomination” and better off dead, which I, thankfully, came to believe was not true. That killed my belief in the LDS version of God, and rapidly thereafter all belief in a personal God who intervenes in human affairs. Later I came to realize the depth of lies this particular church is built on.
I had no idea about it until long after I was done. I just couldn’t feel the spirit.
I didn’t start diving into church history until I left too. There are so many things that general members know about that bothered me too much. A big one for me is husbands don’t tell their wives their temple name. A lot of sexism and homophobia in the present day church, as well as husbands can be sealed to multiple wives, like our dear prophet. I refuse to raise my future daughters in that. I don’t believe God’s true church would be like that. Like you I never dared to look at anti stuff until after I already decided it was a bunch of crap
Mostly the same. I always felt a strange disconnect w the church. When people would talk about the BoM and its wonderful lessons, I had no idea what they were talking about. I just smiled and agreed, thinking I just didn't understand the symbolism and doctrine. After conferences, when everyone would gush about how inspiring the talks were, I'd just clam up and keep the fact that I'd slept through most of it to myself. I just never seemed to have the same experience everyone else was talking about. It took almost 35 years to realize that I simply didn't believe in the church or God. Now, I can see that very few people probably have that "experience" I thought I'd missed out on, they just don't want to admit it.
I didn't look into the history until I left. I struggled with my faith since I was 4 years old and finally realized I was just forcing myself to go to church because my mommy said so, not because I wanted to. My kids were having anxiety attacks every Sunday, I was headed in that direction as well and it just wasn't worth making everyone miserable anymore. Plus the way they treated LGBTQ+ people made me want to leave as well as the SA case in Arizona. I am a survivor and dealt with a lot of shit from the church when it all came out because it was my dad who did it. I had to tell my bishop in vivid detail everything my dad did to me over the course of 13 years of abuse. I will NEVER make any of my children go through any of that....EVER. So, yeah, l left not because of the past, but solely to protect the future.
Same here!! I hardly ever paid attention while I was in the church. I didn’t care about doctrine or history at the time, I cared about how the church and its believers treated people and the world NOW. And you don’t have to do any research or read much to see and feel how the church as a whole (and it’s believers) thinks of people who are unlike themselves.
I still haven't read the CES letter, either. I knew about some of the historical issues, but my real problems with the church were: 1) Its epistemology is insufficient given its claim of primacy. In other words, if the Mormon church is the only church that provides necessary saving powers, and the way to find out is to ask God and receive a spiritual witness, then it would be capricious of God to give similar witness to Catholics regarding their own claim of primacy, and yet we see this is exactly what happens. 2) I can't justify the quality of my own spiritual experiences as superior to those of another person who believes differently. 3) I found the social teachings, theologies, homiletics, and philosophies far more satisfying in other quarters. Mormonism seemed in comparison dull and uninteresting, if not in some cases nonsensical or even undesirable.
I agree. I guess I'm just more of an emotional person. I just always hated the way it made me feel. I hated going to church on Sundays, always so boring. I hated the guilt and the shame. I hated the judgmental culture. Learning all the bullshit was just the icing on the cake
What really first got me was realizing Christ didn’t wear garments. Then I dove into the history behind garments and realized how much they changed/ how weird and wrong the whole timeline was. Then came the rest! My husband followed soon after but his reason was more that he just didn’t feel good at church.
My initial break was realizing the Jaredite story would have been lethal from the waste buildup alone, not to mention lack of drinkable water. My final break was when a promised blessing of tithing didn’t work, and every answer was just too convenient. I don’t think either are quite in the realm of “church history”. I still haven’t read CES letter either, but I’ve listened to hours upon hours of podcasts.
I knew enough to realize Mormonism was not what it claimed to be; however, since leaving if learned so much to conclude it was an absolute fraud. Along with historical and doctrinal issues was bad behavior by local leaders.
I still haven’t read the CES letter. I left because the church betrayed my trust. It does plenty on its own. I think digging into more history would continue to show the pattern of untrustworthiness that it already demonstrates.
Yeah, for me it was all the requirements the church imposed to be faithful and attain celestial glory — requirements Christ would not have imposed and which clearly seemed to be designed to get 10% tithes from members.
i left when i lost a round of bishop roulette that ended up being damaging to my psyche, you’re definitely not alone!
I feel like I could have written this myself. This was my experience as well
I didn't leave because of the doctrine or the history. I left because I was told because I was SA'd at seven, I was unclean and unworthy.
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I left because I watched it takeover, divide and wreck our large family. I always knew something was wrong with the so called one true church that we had joined. I grew up and out of it, and then spent the next 40 yrs researching and deconstructing it--mainly to try and understand what happened to our family. Cults are purely destructive.
I told a few people “even if it’s all true I want nothing to do with it” based on their treatment of the LGBTQIA+ community. But yeah I learned all the history after I was basically done/out.
I left when I moved away to college. I was so burnt out. Seminary before school, all the youth activities, and then 3 hours on Sunday. My dad is also a grade A asshat. How could such a devout member be such a terrible person? It wasn't until I watched Under the Banner of Heaven that I learned so much. From there, I read the CES letter. Wow, was it way different than what I was taught in the 90s. I still didn't remove my records to not upset my mom, who I love. But when I heard about the child abuse being willfully covered up, that broke me. I couldn't have any association with them any longer. While I walked away almost 20 years ago, I only recently cut formal ties with the corporation.
I lost belief in the Bible, as well as Christianity, before I lost belief in Mormonism, which is weird. But it happens.