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I travel in my job almost continuously. Due to some events that are burned into my memory from our ward as a child and teen I do not want the home teachers or missionaries in my home when I am not there. The assigned home teacher calls every month but recently was very rude asking if I wanted him to relay a message to remove my name from the rolls of the church? He makes my wife and children uncomfortable… need I say more on that issue?
I attend church in the cities or countries I am in and I attend when I am at home. Last year I was only home 28 days. None of which were a Sunday except for 2. About a month prior to the 12th birthday of my son, the bishop called my wife to say and I will quote, “I hope your husband does not assume that he is just going to show up and ordain your son”. The reason that I can quote this is because it was recorded on our voice mail system at the house, my wife had picked up the phone after it had started.
I have asked the bishop many times to call me, he has my cell phone, but he refuses. This causes a confrontational atmosphere constantly. I emailed him from where I was at the time, (in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean) and advised him again of the situation and the fact that I did not appreciate what he was doing.
I am a temple recommend holder, in good standing. I am a life long member of the church and I know the church handbook and church doctrine. I support and sustain the leadership of the church.
This really left a bad feeling in my gut and taste in my mouth. I have always been taught that in respect to the priesthood and the Lord that you do not exercise your authority when you have these feelings. After much thought and prayer I advised the bishop that my father would be performing the ordination and I would participate.
He was beside himself. Here I am, in my mind and soul doing what I feel is right for myself and my son and the bishop took it personal. He kept telling me that he was sorry if he offended me but he did not understand why I would be unwilling to ordain my own son.
The relief society is sending weird letters to my wife.
Am I missing the point. I am at a loss to this point…
I am not inactive, but if this is the way that our church treats inactive members this is not right.
Comments… Am I wrong in my feelings or thoughts?
Do you know either of his counselors well enough to talk with one of them? If not, talk to your Stake President or one of his counselors. Approach him humbly, with the exact tone you used here. Your Bishop is wrong. It happens, unfortunately. It’s not normal, and you know it’s not normal. Go over his head,if you don’t feel comfortable talking with a counselor and if he won’t respond to you.
It doesn’t sound right to me either. The untrained, lay-ministry of our Church is a two-edged sword. It’s great that normal people are Bishops, Home Teachers and classroom instructors. It also means that normal people (who might not get it right all the time) are those same people.
I agree with Ray. Be firm and stand up for yourself and your family. The all-important thing is to be firm with love and not anger. This can be a great opportunity for your leaders to see something they are obviously missing. Talk to them. Go over their head if you need to. Do it with love and kindness in your heart (and humility as Ray said). That tends to work wonders. Know what I mean?
Sorry to hear the grief you are going through over this. It’s tough enough being separated from your family so much. We have to do what we have to do these days to support our families. I’ve been looking at some overseas contracting opportunities too lately.
socom8721 wrote:… After much thought and prayer I advised the bishop that my father would be performing the ordination and I would participate.
He was beside himself. Here I am, in my mind and soul doing what I feel is right for myself and my son and the bishop took it personal. He kept telling me that he was sorry if he offended me but he did not understand why I would be unwilling to ordain my own son.
Comments… Am I wrong in my feelings or thoughts?
I think I would feel the same way. I can’t imagine being gone from home so much. I like to travel, but I only travel on business once every 2 or 3 years, and that’s usually for less than 3 days at a time. Maybe your bishop can’t wrap his brain around it, either. Still that’s no excuse.HiJolly
Old-Timer wrote:Do you know either of his counselors well enough to talk with one of them? If not, talk to your Stake President or one of his counselors. Approach him humbly, with the exact tone you used here.
Your Bishop is wrong. It happens, unfortunately. It’s not normal, and you know it’s not normal. Go over his head,if you don’t feel comfortable talking with a counselor and if he won’t respond to you.
I would definitely approach the Stake President, however, record your conversations. If things don’t go well, you can always write your area president throught the office of the seventy. They may not respond directly, but they may send down some direction for training for the local leaders. While the church generally discourages memebers from writing the GA’s for regular questions, if there is a problem with some local leaders you can write them and tell them what is going on. We recently contacted our area president’s office for direction on seeking his help on a matter, and we were told to make our request in writing. Letters to GA’s are read before being sent back to local leaders, so if there was a problem that they felt needed to be discussed with you they will contact you. This is what happened with me.
I know it has been a while… but I want to follow up. In answer to your questions and your advise. His counselors at the time, well the 1st counselor was the Home Teacher and the 2nd counselor was not friendly. I did talk to the SP. Things got worse in the ward as a member started (i will just say) bothering my daughter and wife and making them very uncomfortable on top of everything else. I spoke with the Bishop and asked that he intervene and his response was, ” I gotta think about the best way to go about this”. Well whatever he did, it got worse. That bishop moved and the new bishop called that member to the Bishopric and then it really got worse. I wrote an email to the SP and the Bishop and basically when I met with the SP he told me that nothing would happen, I needed to have a talk with my wife and daughter as he did not feel that it was a big deal.
Well, it continued and I had to involve law enforcement. The SP is a powerful attorney with a very large corporation that is very politically connected. Also very connected in SLC.
SP asked me to meet again after that and basically really let me have it, I felt in a very threatening manner as to my status in the church. He never came right out and said excommunication or HC Court, but he sure hinted around that. At some point at about 45 minutes into this in his office I said, ” You need to stop…” ” I went to my bishop and simply asked that he, as the patriarch of the ward, put a stop to this man’s activity.” ” All I am asking is that he no longer have any contact with my family… ANYONE in my family.” ” Otherwise, I will take matters into my own hands no matter the cost.”
The SP just looked at me for like 30 seconds and then said, “We can do that.”
Ever since then, the SP, who is still the same guy, won’t even acknowledge me or my family. We have had two more bishops since that time, I have been recommended for leadership positions and the SP says, “No way”. LOL I am not complaining not to have the callings, they would have been time consuming. But as I search, read and ponder… why would I be denied the blessings when others were in the wrong. Is this a test of my faith? Wow…
So, I will tell you this, I am tired of hearing the leadership of the church say to me, “If I have done anything to offend you…” I know you are all human and just like any of the rest of us, but the holier than though aspect of our leadership needs to go. I was raised in the church and taught in the robotic mind shaping manner how to pray, teach, preach and act. Down to the testimony… Thank goodness I woke up! Think for myself and realize that callings by divine revelation is utter b.s. If you are worthy and stand up for what is truly right, a SP or Bishop is scared of you. If you do not teach in the manner that they are comfortable with, even if you are teaching the gospel to the letter they are scared of you and do not want the truth.
In all of this I have learned, There are ways that I can serve outside of the church that magnify my blessings for myself and my family even more than what I got from helping and serving in the church itself. Most of the members in our ward anyway want something for nothing. Finally, my children and my family are a shining beacon irregardless of our religion. Our faith and our belief is strong despite these self righteous pretenders who will ultimately get there just reward in the end.
There are some that doubt what I say… ha ha ha go ahead. I have nothing to gain by making this up… I just hope that you do not ever move into this town or this ward. I hope your wife is happy and that you treat her well. I hope your daughters are strong and not offended easily. Otherwise, you might find yourself in marriage discord or the same situation I was in, cause they are still here offending others in very very bad ways…
It is what it is… be careful… and oh, I do not trust ANY members of the church… I only trust myself and my family!
:crazy: It is sad to hear about situations like this. The only consolation is that it is very different in other places in the Church, but it also is far too similar in too many others. “We have learned by sad experience . . . exercise unrighteous dominion . . .” is SO true.
socom8721 wrote:In all of this I have learned, There are ways that I can serve outside of the church that magnify my blessings for myself and my family even more than what I got from helping and serving in the church itself.
Ya know…there are times in life when I feel the Lord allows us to see the good in the world outside the church, and helps us appreciate it. I have wondered that in my life many times. Perhaps we need that lesson in order to know how to deal with the church.
Getting police involved to protect your family is something you should do, whether church leaders agree with it or not. It is your family.
So sorry to hear this situation has gone on for so long. Its sad.
socom8721 wrote:Well, it continued and I had to involve law enforcement.
If you can’t say, or don’t want to get into it, no problem, but what on earth was happening?
Edit: I guess I should have assumed that you’ve said as much as you want to.
Just this, then: hope all goes better for you and your family from here on out. What a blessing to feel completely secure with them.
Please don’t feel any pressure to share more details here. If you want to do so, that’s fine – but please don’t feel any pressure to do so. I had a similar experience. I won’t go into the details, but it involved written abuse, widely disseminated to the entire Ward leadership. Floored me….and the leadership did nothing about it. They couldn’t care less. And at the risk of repeating this too much, I’m now on the community service plan. There’s a lot of places you can serve outside the church. And guess what:
a) You can choose where you serve
b) You can release yourself whenever you want
c) You can pick causes for which you are truly passionate
d) You do not risk social ostracization due to weaker cultural values
e) You can move from organization to organization as your skills and passions change throughout your life
f) You can see the impact of your financial contributions and there is transparency (in the organization I have experience with)
g) Many organizations show far more appreciation and don’t take you for granted either.
g) It’s not as repetitive.
And so on….
Not for everyone, but based on what you’ve experienced, and suggested, I highly recommend it.
SD
Silent Dawning: We have been doing that for years, even before this happened. Donating our time and money to great organizations outside of the church.
I can tell you all… I am not afraid, but do not feel comfortable sharing more… they lurk in places such as this.
:crazy: But the experienced has both opened my eyes for a clear vision of what the CHURCH really is in relation to the gospel itself.
They were so concerned about the OFFENDER, that it really shocked me in the fact that the local church leadership had NO DESIRE to talk to my wife or my daughter… It was almost as if they did not want to know the truth.
Anyway… I am consoled in the fact that I stood up for what was right. In the end I prevailed, the message got through to them loud and clear and all of the nonsense came to a grinding halt.
Despite the negative things and craziness of the ward and stake here, my family has blossomed and we have success and happiness in our personal growth and our friends outside of the church membership. We just have had to make a choice to go to church for what it is and keep the rest of that mess and those people out of our home.
Wow, this is just crazy. I know it happens, and unfortunately, the fact is that some leaders in particular are prone to protecting “insiders” at peril to the flock, even when those insiders are just charismatic and reliable to them but harmful to the lay membership. It’s not normal, it’s rare, but it sure has happened. And there really is no way to deal with it better than you have since the church doesn’t have great insight into it. The hear the story through the hierarchy (the SP, who hears from the bishop, who is listening to his persuasive counselor who is the problem) which is a self-sustaining group. Average members really don’t have any cred. I am sometimes skeptical, but not really cynical. I just think you have to be pragmatic in dealing with people who abuse their power. socom8721 wrote:
Despite the negative things and craziness of the ward and stake here, my family has blossomed and we have success and happiness in our personal growth and our friends outside of the church membership. We just have had to make a choice to go to church for what it is and keep the rest of that mess and those people out of our home.This dawned on me a while ago. We found ourselves as a “family without a Ward” a while ago. Again, I won’t give details, but we felt sort of homeless because we did not want to attend our home ward, and found a ward we loved. But that ward could not accept us wholeheartedly due to church policy that prohibits callings unless you live in it.
Then it dawned on me — we can have a happy, blossoming family without a Ward in which to flourish. You can still teach and train at home, you can still create values that come to life, you can take trips together and have activities. you can love each other and celebrate each other.
The church is only a “support” — the main life source is the family life you have together, and the church can’t take that away. By their own admission, they are only a supplement to it.
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They were so concerned about the OFFENDER, that it really shocked me in the fact that the local church leadership had NO DESIRE to talk to my wife or my daughter… It was almost as if they did not want to know the truth.That has been my experience. As soon as you stop responding to the church experience the way they want, they turn on you. When I withdrew my commitment beyond Sunday attendance a while ago, they went behind my back to wife to pump her for information. They even told a story about how when one of them was weak in commitment, their wife threatened divorce unless he straightened up. And I had only lessened my involvement after serving in a high profile position for pete’s sake!!!! Talk about disloyalty and focusing on offenses.
I agree that you can only trust your family explicitly. Sadly, policy tends to trump individual needs in our church. I think it might have something to do with our history. The church was constantly assaulted by outside forces in its genesis period. I think this has led to a strong culture of self-preservation which tends to really stand on guard against so-called offenders. We are very organization-centric, and I think it partly has to do with the preservationist values of our early church.
Modern leaders tend to assimilate these values given the one-true church and top-down governance that typifies our organization.
hawkgrrrl wrote:I know it happens, and unfortunately, the fact is that some leaders in particular are prone to protecting “insiders” at peril to the flock, even when those insiders are just charismatic and reliable to them but harmful to the lay membership. It’s not normal, it’s rare, but it sure has happened. And there really is no way to deal with it better than you have since the church doesn’t have great insight into it. The hear the story through the hierarchy (the SP, who hears from the bishop, who is listening to his persuasive counselor who is the problem) which is a self-sustaining group. Average members really don’t have any cred.
I have seen this in our area too and it is disheartening to the flock when it’s very obvious.
SilentDawning wrote:I agree that you can only trust your family explicitly.
Beware of inlaws and sometimes even immediate family!
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