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Blurg. I am just needing to say a little something about OM and the disaffected in general. I know most of you are not active there anymore, although all of you have been there at some point. I have remained active there until very recently when I’ve just been super busy. It’s just frustrating that all these stories seem to end up in the same place: with them leaving the church or when their spouse finally caves in, they go completely out of the church. I’m just feeling that the pull of NOM (which I think has many unhealthy aspects) is a cycle that repeats. I really do get why people are disaffected, but I don’t understand why it seems to inevitably lead to not reconciling their issues. I know that’s why we’re here. Just bummed about another one who bit the dust over there. Grouping the disaffected into a community creates a social norm that doesn’t result in resolving disaffection. It’s like the “sick” room at the pediatrician.
Misery loves company. Unfortunately, it’s self-perpetuating and self-fulfilling – especially when anyone who tries to present an alternative is ridiculed. I left, frankly, because I’m not into swabbing wounds with poison. I like what we do here, instead.
Anyone in particular that I might know? Yeah … it really is tough sometimes to watch it all. I just can’t hang out in those places for long stretches of time anymore. I really do love the people at OM and NOM. I really enjoyed connecting in person with people in the Atlanta area. We had some wonderful get-togethers (they still do them, just I am not longer there). Claire Eden, and Randy Butterfield / Mel Selcho were kind enough to host several of them. It was nice to meet Cheryl Bruno too. All great folks, and felt almost like an alternate LDS Ward in some ways. I even finally got Ellen (my DW) to go to a couple and she really liked the people.
Other than the real life connection potential, OM (to me) is just a more exclusive and private NOM, with all the same angst and heartaches. I just don’t think you can help people be positive and see the good (in the Church or in their life) when there are a dozen other people “in the room” all thrashing around and shouting about how horrible and damaging it all is, or how stupid and un-scientific belief might be (which totally misses the point). Your pediatrician “Sick Room” analogy is spot on.
As long as people do not firmly take hold of the power to shape their experience in life and the Church, positive faith is too fragile to withstand that storm. That’s my observation. People are seeking confirmation from the group around them, and those groups trend towards less faith and less positive energy. Still … I firmly believe that NOM plays an important role in the universe of Internet Mormonism. It is a much softer landing place than RfM. I think if people are going to leave the Church in the end, NOM/OM is a much better “processing center” for that, to help them make the transition in a more healthy way.
Why can’t people reconcile? I don’t think it is so hard either, and I really sometimes think people are so wrapped up in themselves they can’t even see what is going on around them. We truly make our reality in most ways. A couple things come to mind when watching people in disaffection, things that really are a case of not “seeing”
-People with theology and history concerns:
The vast majority of the problems don’t exist for someone in the Church in 2010. They are phantoms of the past. The Church, from the top, has quietly walked away from almost all of it, to the point of Pres Hinkley even being very stand-off-ish about the idea of becoming Gods on the Larry King show interview. I am not saying there aren’t still problems, especially when it comes to dealing with homosexuality and women’s power-authority within the organization, but we’ve said goodbye to polygamy, adam-god, blood atonement, and all the other hard-to-swallow speculations.
-People with social concerns:
I must be the luckiest freaking person in all of Mormonism when it comes to being in wards with decent and caring people trying to do their best. I’ve moved around a lot in my life, and been in big, highly functional wards ready to split, all the way down to tiny branches at an outpost Army base in Korea where the “branch president” was a buddy and we had all of 6 or 7 people show up. I have probably been a member of literally 20 wards in my lifetime, and 10 of those as an adult. I’ve found a lot of nice people, realistic and tolerant people, people willing to go out of their way to connect with me and help my family and I (and I can help them). I wasn’t even very active for a lot of that time, and certainly not completely orthodox.
Yet so many disaffected find enemies and offense around every corner? I hear the stories over and over again.
There was only one case in my life I can think of, and that was when I was a teenager in high school. I found out some parents in the ward didn’t want their daughters dating me or associating with me. But I had black hair, pierced ears, wore combat boots and “funny” clothes even to church, drank, did drugs and played in a goth band. I wouldn’t have recommended their daughters date me either
😆 So I guess I just happened to randomly be in the 20 best wards in all of the Church … unless it was something else, something about me and my relationship with the world around me.
I hear ya. Ditto, ditto! It baffles me why people don’t seem to want to grow out of the limitations of their present view. There is ALWAYS something limiting about our present human view – no matter how enlightened we think we’ve become. That’s why I love the idea of eternal progression. Go figure.
On a side note I recently received a very interesting email from my bishop. I should say he has been a good friend since before he became bishop – but in the note he talked of becoming more open minded and charitable, and he wonders why more people haven’t come to him expressing some faith crisis. He thought most people apparently don’t have the time or interest to read much. The words CogDis were used and the assumption that there is more to our history and scriptural origins than most members assume. So I’m saying I also feel very lucky Brian!
I don’t believe you guys are just lucky. I think there is something about the way you are that influences your experience and how you see the same things that others get offended by, and look past the offense to see the good in your wards. I mean that. As I have thought about the same thing Hawkgrrrl expressed, I think a lot comes down to motivation. I think some people are just looking for a way out anyway, they aren’t motivated to want to work it out. Others are so hurt, they aren’t motivated to want to reconcile (which takes a lot of motivation)…they’d rather just place blame and justify themselves and seek reinforcement by other anonymous people. I wonder how many stories people tell on the blogs about how their leaders treated them would change if they actually sat down with you and me and their leader face to face and actually talked through exactly what happened. Are they expressing things online more out of emotion than real facts? Perhaps. Then again, perception is reality.
I think it takes a mature, healthy, and strong person to want to face the issues in Stage 4 and actually seek peaceful amends. Not a lot of people do it in their marriages (sweeping generalizations here) and not a lot of people do it with the church. It is just easier to give up and not try.
That has been my observations and thoughts. I think it revolves a lot around motivation to try, and if they have that motivation, they may still be involved at church so they are not finding the blogs. If they don’t have that motivation, they need something else rather than church to go to, so the sample population on the blogs are likely skewed to the “less than motivated to work it out” group. And I respect John Dehlin’s work because I do think in many ways the church does not offer help in reconciliation strategies. As loving as they try to be, the teachings and facade seem to project that the church is always right and they hope to persuade everyone to see and accept that. As we know, it is more complicated than that.
It’s so hard to me because the more you talk to folks who don’t believe, the less you believe – the easier it is to feel that it’s more normal to not believe than it is to believe, and then there are other natural forces that move you: 1 –
being Mormon is tough. Justification to let go of some of the standards is doubly compelling – there’s a lot of finger-crossing that it won’t be necessary to endure to the end. It’s so much easier to set down the burden. And frankly, some of the burdens are kind of silly. But by the same token, burdens are made light when you don’t think about them. They only become heavy when you concentrate on them. 2 –
villification of believers. When believers are continually painted in the most unflattering, judgmental and fanatical terms possible, and so many examples of cluelessness, abuse, hypocrisy, and poor judgment are bandied about, it’s much easier to identify outside the group and not want to belong. Yet, most of the actual people I know in the church bear little resemblance to these stories. It seems like if you reduce that argument to it’s basic core, it’s justifying your own behavior because of what others do or don’t do, or it’s a prideful thing – comparing one’s best qualities to the worst qualities in others. Either way, it’s not very enlightened. 3 –
what you put out there is what you get back. The more you expect people to behave like idiots in the church, the more you look down on their naivete, the more you are going to be transparent in your disdain and the more likely that your disdain will result in rejection by the group. You can’t go into a group thinking you are all superior and expect them to agree with you. It’s just not how it works. Humility goes further than arrogance. Anyway, just feeling rather discouraged. I had wanted to do some good on OM, but it’s no longer enough if all the good I do is helping people land softer outside the church. I can see why the church cautions against hanging out with apostates, even though it is framed in harsh rhetoric and is inconsistent with Jesus’ example. But creating a club of the disaffected with no aim at Staying LDS is only going to result in everyone inevitably believing less, adhering less, and most eventually leaving.
(sigh). I see the same thing at Mormon Stories 2nd ward…I don’t think that is a coincidence. It seems to be the way things go. 
hawkgrrrl wrote:Anyway, just feeling rather discouraged. I had wanted to do some good on OM, but it’s no longer enough …
You do a lot of good everywhere you go Hawkrrrl. I always love your sharp analysis and positive outlook. But yeah … you gotta decide where your time is well spent. It is a precious commodity. And I totally know what you mean about that drag and pull on the soul.
This is going to sound really stupid of me, but I never figured out where the OM 2nd ward is located on the internet. I think I responded to an email from John once when the idea first came up, but I forgot to refocus on it.
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