- This topic is empty.
-
Posts
-
Hello All Long time observer of this site, and finally moving along stages of faith to where I feel making myself known feels right.
I am a v-young convert to church (family joined when I was 7) now touching 40, I may as well been born into it, so embeded is the church is in my makeup. As you may have guessed from my username I am a brit, I live in the Manchester area of the UK, married to a TBM (in the Temple) with kids, and surrounded by TBM’s in family terms.
I stopped attended church about 10 years ago now, after discovering some of the issues with the truth claims of the church. They news wasn’t bad for me as I have seen it be with others, as I guess I was a liberal mormon anyway, wouldn’t have called myself ultra-orthodox. I never really lost touch with the church because of the amount of TBMs in my family, always went to socials, often helping. I can count on 2 fingers the conversations I have had with local leadership about why I no longer attend, but given the way things travel in church, my reasons are probably well known. Those conversations never went well anyway, pointless if I am honest. On the odd occasion I did attend church, I found myself biting my tounge and surfing RfM on my iPhone. I am also a active member of the exmo-commuinity here in the UK, organised and attended a few get together, run a website for us all.
Though, following a few years of Mormon Stories, reading fowlers stages in faith, and me passing through the anger stage, I am starting to view church differently. I had a great time as a youth and YSA in the church, and beyond as a young married couple, the church is a great community, it does social networking really well, and it is underpinned by some (not all!) good values. If I view it as a community, it’s great, it’s when I try to view it as a religion I have issues.
As a good community citizen I want to start contributing, though I am stugling to grasp how I can do that, given my understanding of the truth claims of the church, I don’t want to lie about it. I can no longer believe the church as I did before, I know the ‘church is NOT true’ but I want to be there and help. I wouldn’t mind a calling, but when and if they have an interview with me about it, I can’t answer the questions truthfully. I also don’t really want to move away from the UK exmo comminity, as I think its a valuable service to those that need it.
So here I am between 2 worlds and trying to muddle my way through it.
That’s a tough situation to juggle. You sound pretty calm and peaceful about it all though, very analytic. I’m glad to have you here in the community with us, and look forward to hearing more from you. Sorry, i’m super-busy at work today. I want to try and respond better tomorrow. Welcome to the group! You have an interesting introduction. I’m looking forward to reading more of your postings.
Mike from Milton.
Welcome, brit-exmo. It sounds like you are hoping to contribute. That is a bit of a tough thing, because callings require the worthiness interviews, which as you said, you won’t lie to get through and you don’t believe the church is “true”.
Have you had any recent discussions lately with local leaders on how to contribute? There may be plenty of service opportunities, regardless of calling or not.
How do your wife and kids handle your situation?
Just curious. Share if you wish, but just appreciated your story and wanted to say welcome to the forum. I look forward to learning from your posts.
Welcome, brit-exmo wrote:I also don’t really want to move away from the UK exmo community, as I think its a valuable service to those that need it.
Funny- I tend to associate ex-Mormons with anti-Mormons. I understand that there is a lot of anger coming from some (especially recent) ex-Mormons, and I just assumed that an ex-mo community would embody that anger.
I imagine that a percentage of the persons that visit this site end up not participating at church anymore. I hope that (whatever their ultimate decision might be) they are able to come to a softer landing and make a better decision based on the needs of their life after spending time here.
I likewise hope that the ex-mo community you are connected to helps those individuals that need it to adapt and move forward.
I completely understand what you mean about being in between two worlds. I think of it as a kind of dualism, able to speak the language of two different cultures. There are both pros and cons with this arrangement.
I look forward to your perspective.
Welcome to the site. I think the ex-Mo forums can be useful if they help people find a less antagonistic place, peace rather than a sword (as it were). Glad you are in a good place and would like to contribute. Thanks for the replies people – agree with you all its a difficult position to be in. I think it’s harder to return to activity than ‘staying in’ – in returning you are almost going back on a previously stated position, but with staying in you can make the transition without making any public statements (verbal or non-verbal) about your change in belief.
And yes some of the exmo’s can be angry, but who am I to criticise as I was there at some point! I think it’s important that they have a place to be, plus I am a serial community creator, I can’t help it
brit-exmo wrote:I also don’t really want to move away from the UK exmo comminity, as I think its a valuable service to those that need it.
FWIW, I think this is an important work too. Helping people process their faith transition in as healthy a way as possible (whichever direction they go, in or out) is a work of compassion and love. It makes the world a better place. Personally, I think someone like you could still be involved in helping people in that regard and still be a part of the Mormon community. I hang out with lots of ex-mo’s and post-mo’s. There’s a ton of work out there to do — helping families stay together through the faith crisis transition, etc.
Welcome. I enjoyed reading about your perspective. I appreciate your tone and the uniqueness of your position with regard to the church. I think that people’s success in negotiating a healthy path through all of this often depends on having an understanding spouse or some other close friend in whom they can confide. I don’t mean to pry, but you mentioned being married at one point. I’m wondering how your wife, if you’re still married, feels about all of this.
doug wrote:Welcome. I enjoyed reading about your perspective. I appreciate your tone and the uniqueness of your position with regard to the church.
I think that people’s success in negotiating a healthy path through all of this often depends on having an understanding spouse or some other close friend in whom they can confide. I don’t mean to pry, but you mentioned being married at one point. I’m wondering how your wife, if you’re still married, feels about all of this.
Thanks for your nice words, it is appreciated.
So my wife and I are still married after 15 good years, she did take it hard when I first stopped attending, and even went slightly less active herself. But our love transcends religion and she was able to see that my moving away from the church made me a happier person. Now I am starting to attend Sunday services a bit more I can tell it makes her happier too.
Ideally I would like to be able to baptise my kids, as I think it would be important for them, even though I don’t believe myself I can appreciate the emotional impact (positive) it would haveon my family. But the discussions with the bishop will be interesting on that, it’s a few years off anyway (oldest is 5) I guess I have time to work up to that.
brit-exmo wrote:I also don’t really want to move away from the UK exmo comminity, as I think its a valuable service to those that need it.
Welcome!
But is there really that much of a UK LDS community? Exmo or otherwise? In my experience, it doesn’t really exist in the same way that, that of Utah does.
I think the “church is true/not true” thing is not completely helpful. The church is right about certain things, very much so, but there are also some things which it is horribly wrong about (its past handling of gay and race issues leaves a lot to be desired.) The all-or-nothing approach doesn’t work for me.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.