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Hello, this is my first time writing on here, but I have read through a lot of other posts from other people and I appreciate everyone’s experiences/thoughts. I am also grateful to John Dehlin and all of the Mormon Stories podcasts to help me to figure a lot of things out. Over the last six months I guess you could say I’ve gone from a traditional LDS believer to Atheist (although I don’t like this term because of it’s negative connotations and wish there was a better term). It’s been a difficult journey and I don’t necessarily recommend it, but also a very rewarding one. It was a little painful at first, but now I have found a peace and calm and joy that I’ve never had before. Everything makes sense to me. Anyway, I still go to church and don’t mind it. In fact I kind of like going and do miss it some when I don’t. Even though I don’t always go the whole time and don’t listen much etc. I have a lot of friends there and really like lds people and the community. Also my family is all lds and they’re really cool and I think the church has helped our family a lot even though for me it’s been something I’ve struggled with because I couldn’t ever really make sense of it. But I like keeping my morals and ethics still and in fact am grateful for my LDS upbringing in a lot of ways. Anyway I guess my biggest struggle is dating girls and trying to find an LDS girl who thinks the way I do. I’m trying to figure this out and would love some insight and/or suggestions if anyone has any. Thanks in advance. Welcome! 
Hi Columbo, Welcome to our community. Glad to have you along for the ride, and look forward to hearing more about your thoughts and your journey.
A few of my thoughts on atheism — atheism a lot of times (mostly IMO) is a rejection of a former or particular view of deity. What I mean by that is that people who go this route are often clearing themselves of their assumptions and expectations of their definition of deity, beliefs that did not work for them. In our western culture, this takes the form of rejecting and purging belief in an image of God as a man with a white beard, wearing robes, sitting on a throne somewhere, who micromanages the affairs of the world and your personal life. Also, a being that is doling out rewards and punishments to his pets (humans) based a particular revealed set of rules (revealed by humans).
So my point is this: atheists are often saying “I reject
that!” But when you sit quietly and contemplate the meaning of this rejection, it actually leaves open an enormous spectrum of every other possibility for exploration. I don’t mean to put words into anyone’s mouth, but those are my general thoughts on atheism. As far as looking for other liberally-believing LDS to date, I am not sure I have a lot of advice. I’ve been out of the dating scene for a couple decades. I know a guy who found his wife on one of the LDS singles websites, and he was specifically looking for someone along those lines and found her. I could maybe get you in touch with him for suggestions. But he was older, and it doesn’t seem like “dating” online is the same as finding people locally. Perhaps it would work better in high-density LDS area?
The trouble with that kind of atheism is that it often unconsciously integrates Christian ideas into its new paradigm. My problem is dating LDS
women– there aren’t many left. Most LDS females want RMs (Pres Monson isn’t even one) and marry before they become women. Columbo wrote:Anyway I guess my biggest struggle is dating girls and trying to find an LDS girl who thinks the way I do. I’m trying to figure this out and would love some insight and/or suggestions if anyone has any. Thanks in advance.
Hi, and welcome to the forum.I don’t have personal experience to help you out…but my observations would be that there are probably not a large population of LDS girls that think like you described you do from your journey. So in reality, your selection in the church is likely limited.
I would think if you’re really athiest in beliefs, a girl could be in the church or outside the church and have similar thoughts and beliefs. I also think there are many other sources that help raise children with good beliefs and morals…the LDS church is one but doesn’t have a monopoly on that.
Just some thoughts. I look forward to reading more of your posts and learning from you. Thanks for being here.
Quote:Atheist (although I don’t like this term because of it’s negative connotations and wish there was a better term).
NB – a lot of people who think they are atheists are really agnostics… There’s less negative press attached to that one.
Heber13 wrote:I would think if you’re really athiest in beliefs, a girl could be in the church or outside the church and have similar thoughts and beliefs. I also think there are many other sources that help raise children with good beliefs and morals…the LDS church is one but doesn’t have a monopoly on that.
Columbo, please correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m guessing you’re concerned about some of the cultural baggage that comes with being raised LDS and a non-LDS-raised woman might not understand or appreciate that. While it’s true that it’s possible for anyone to have solid morals regardless of their faith tradition, outside of the LDS culture it can be very difficult to find someone that either doesn’t believe in drinking or premarital sex or respect your beliefs in those areas. I’m also long-removed from the dating scene (thank goodness!
You might also want to consider something I read on Feminist Mormon Housewives once that all marriages are inter-faith marriages to some degree. No two people will have exactly the same religious beliefs, even if they belong to the same church.
Welcome Columbo! SamBee wrote:NB – a lot of people who think they are atheists are really agnostics… There’s less negative press attached to that one.
I agree, and I’d say hard-line atheism is really another form of a religion. They have tenets that they hold onto tightly, with very little backing. The difficulty is you can’t prove God doesn’t exist. You can show a probability that some ideas about God are likely faulty, but you can’t prove that no God or higher power exists in any form.
I’ve talked to a number of supposed “atheists”, and a lot of them fall into the “don’t know” category rather than the “I know for sure” category, which makes them agnostics. I always wanted to set up a militant agnostic movement.
“What do we want?”
“Something or other!”
“When do we want it?”
“We’re not sure!”
Since the skeptics have Richard Dawkins and James Randi as their prophets, maybe the agnostics should have some too. But nobody knows who they are.
SamBee wrote:I’ve talked to a number of supposed “atheists”, and a lot of them fall into the “don’t know” category rather than the “I know for sure” category, which makes them agnostics.
I always wanted to set up a militant agnostic movement.
“What do we want?”
“Something or other!”
“When do we want it?”
“We’re not sure!”
Since the skeptics have Richard Dawkins and James Randi as their prophets, maybe the agnostics should have some too. But nobody knows who they are.
I nominate this as a contender for the “StayLDS Post of the Year” award.
Great stuff Sam!
😆 Quote:“What do we want?”
“Something or other!”
“When do we want it?”
“We’re not sure!”
I agree. This is amazing, Sam!
Well, I was an agnostic for many years, but I don’t know that I am one now. Thanks, glad you enjoyed it. (I know some militant atheists – militant to the level of being idiotic, although they do have a case with certain things, but the idea of militant agnosticism is much more fun.)
Welcome Columbo. I’ll give you some pointers as a former athiest leaning agnostic but I’m not really sure of what to tell you that might not offend an atheist or leaning agnostic.
I’m sure you’ll find plenty of athiests on the mormon internet or agnostics. Most athiests I have ever met say they never believed but that’s a crock, nine times out of ten you’ll catch them in an angry moment and they spill out that a, b, c, or d happened and why would a loving god let bad things happen to a, b, c, or d. Then we hear “Oh when something good happens it’s a miracle and you give God credit.”
I’m saying this because StayLDS is a friendly crowd. There are other “recomended” sites full of p— and vinegar and will give you all the backing you’ll ever want. They’ll tell you whatever you want to hear and commiserate with enough tears to fill an ocean. They can’t see they have become the dogmatic, hypocritical, blind, and negative force they claim the LDS church to be, or faith of any kind for that matter. They basically create thier own religion of anti-mormonism/religion and don’t realize it.
Basically do whatever it takes to be true to yourself. If athiesm is truely your path and makes you happy follow it. However remember that just because someone tells you what you may want to hear at any given moment, they don’t always have a pure intent. Many times they just want to drag you down to thier level of misery and dispair.
SamBee wrote:Well, I was an agnostic for many years, but I don’t know that I am one now.
In my view, we’re all agnostics. We can neither ‘know’ that God exists nor that He doesn’t. We can choose to believe that He does, or to believe that He does not, and both choices involve a leap of faith.
Columbo wrote:Anyway I guess my biggest struggle is dating girls and trying to find an LDS girl who thinks the way I do. I’m trying to figure this out and would love some insight and/or suggestions if anyone has any. Thanks in advance.
Piece of cake. Just check out John Dehlin’s list of friends on Facebook. It may take you a couple of weeks to sift, but it’s much better and easier than any other idea I can think of. As soon as you identify a few potential young lady friends and tap into their networks, I’m sure the field will open wide for you.
p.s. Same to you, SamBee. If I were looking, that’s what I would do.
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