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Howdy all! I have enjoyed reading the discussions for a few months now and thought I’d actually join in the discussion now. A little about me: I’m a senior at BYU, raised in the church, served a mission, married in the temple, and am fully active. My questions were mostly shelved until about a year ago, when I began a slow deconstruction. I am an active reader and will now read pretty much anything I can get my hands on related to church doctrine, practice, or history. I am a frequent Mormon Stories and Matters listener as well. I find myself much in the vein of where Richard Bushman found himself, which is that the question for me is not so much whether the church is true or not, but if there is a God or not. I feel as if I can deal with all of the ambiguity and contradictions in church doctrine and history if I knew there was a God. (Can anyone else relate??) I do not know at this point whether it’s really possible to know anything, although I’m open to the fact that maybe there is a way that I haven’t discovered yet. Deep down, I really do believe and feel that there is perhaps something more profound and beautiful about this life, and I feel as if I am brushing up against something “true” or good without being able to put it in exact terms.
As far as support goes, I’ve talked to my wife about my concerns, who is a TBM but has been very supportive, even if not able to fully comprehend what I’m going through. I’ve gotten some good support from a trusted religion professor, and recently I opened up to my parents, who are generally pretty deep thinkers and were understanding of where I was coming from.
So that’s me. I look forward to some good discussions!
Welcome and glad you joined the discussion. You sound like you have some good support and are working through things responsibly. I look forward to reading more from your posts and your ideas. Welcome and thanks for taking part. I can relate to your thoughts and my own are not totally dissimilar. I don’t know (that great Mormon word) there’s a God, either, but I think there is and I believe there is. I don’t believe God is like what most TBMs believe he is like though. If I did have a better assurance that there is a God and what he is like, I too could deal with some of the church. Glad you have support from your family! That is great. Be careful though — experience has shown that too much openness about doubts leads to loss of priviledges and other nasties you may not have anticipated. I’ve used up my available time commenting in other threads (sorry 😳 ), but I do want to welcome you to the group. I hope your participation here helps you and us. Based on your intro, I believe it will.Welcome John! ([ominously] if that is your real name… 😯 )Welcome to the group. Great intro! Hi and welcome. I’m really glad to hear you have people you can speak to. It’s especially good that your wife and parents haven’t thrown you under the bus. Hi, JohnLocke – Glad you’re here and I’m looking forward to your posts because you’re actually talking with those close to you. Thanks everyone! I am very glad I have some support. No one has “thrown me under the bus” yet, so to speak. I’ll make sure that I post the reactions I get when I bring up various topics with people. Being a BYU student at this time has been an interesting experience as well. I wish there was some kind of support group on campus for people to talk about these issues. I wish I knew of more religion professors that maybe were more open-minded and understanding. That’s been a great help to me. Church has been tough lately. I serve in a calling that requires me to attend ward council and PEC and my bishop is very strict and very hardline on the doctrine. I’ve experienced some tension between how I want to run my organization and being micro-managed by him. I was thinking the other day about how little we talk about Christ in sacrament meetings, and it’s very much a “keep the commandments and you’ll be blessed” type of atmosphere. I think it’s just recently been dawning on me how nebulous and rather unhelpful of a teaching that is. What kind of blessings? It’s almost always connected with some kind of prosperity – you’ll find a job, be ok financially, etc. But when those things don’t happen, they are “trials.” So it’s just circular logic to me. I think the only thing anyone could ever promise for keeping the commandments is perhaps inner peace or communion with God, and even that requires more than just checking off a list. I can relate to the question of God, it bothered me at one point for a little while. I then realized I could let all the shackles off and allow God to be whatever IS. At a minimum that was my start, I chose not to define God in a narrow way and then wonder if He exists – I chose to define God as the reality of the Love, Truth, nature and goodness that does exist and then only wonder about any additional details of His true “composition”. I have grown very comfortable speaking in terms of God, though I will freely admit I cannot comprehend what God is. If I hold some erroneous ideas about God I hope they will come to light and I can let them go. I don’t view God as a micro-manager that will choose to help one person find their car keys while denying another across the globe the necessities to sustain life. I certainly get that whole circular logic and nebulous blessing thing. That’s a major part of my crisis of faith. I’m pretty sure there isn’t a support group at BYU for those that question/doubt, but maybe there is something less formal. Maybe you could ask the professor you trust if he is aware of something.
One thing for now that I’m sure you know already, but it’s worth mentioning: BYU is a unique place (for multiple reasons), and one of the reasons is that you tend to get Bishops who are more stereotypically orthodox (like your current Bishop). I understand the various reasons for that, but there are many, many Bishops outside that sort of unique place that are far less hardline. Of course, there are Bishops who are just as hardline, but . . .
Learn from your current situation how you will act if you ever are in a situation of leadership in the Church, of any kind. If you don’t like his “management style”, begin to craft your own alternate style. It’s good to take challenging, potentially negative things like this and turn them around by treating them as learning experiences. It’s amazing how often that approach can make a huge difference in how you experience something.
Also, you have plenty of time to deal “publicly” with your concerns. You still are young (says someone who probably has at least two kids your age or older – thank for reminding me how old I am
I can relate very well to your thinking concern God. I felt like I knew that the church was true but couldn’t wrap my mind around the concept of God and the way he blesses some people and then let awful thinks happen to others. I still don’t have clue why this is. When I first thought what if the church really isn’t true it scared me because being a member has been one of the best things of my life and it was/is so much a part of me. I am so grateful for this site because it has helped me cope with all these new feeling and thoughts. I hope that it can help you too. BYU would be a hard place to go through a faith crisis but I am willing to bet that there are more people going through this than you realize. Be careful who you talk to because BYU has the power to kick you out if they think you are too much of an apostate. I graduated from BYU and still cheer for their sport teams. I hope we hear more from you and if you do find a support group there let us know. Thanks for getting me out of the hatch.
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