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Alright, I guess it’s time for me to stop lurking in the background and join the group. I can’t tell you how relieved I was to find this forum a few months ago. It’s great to see that there are other people out there who have all kinds of different questions and issues, but are still looking for reasons to ‘stay LDS.’ I grew up pretty TBM, served a mission, married in the temple, etc. But, I’ve never been one to accept things on faith alone. I’m an analytic thinker, and that can be a good thing or a bad thing. My crisis has been a very gradual experience, which has been drawn out over the past 18 years, since the first time I attended the temple. My initial reaction was confusion and unease. I thought that if I just kept going to the temple, and as I learned more, it would start to become a comfortable place. Everybody talks about it as being the most holy place on earth, and how the spirit is so strong there and everything, so I thought it would just take time. Well, to skip ahead, I spend almost two decades going to the temple and have never felt comfortable there. It’s always felt strange. About a year ago, my bishop called me in for a temple recommend interview. I spilled my guts and told him I don’t feel comfortable there, and would prefer not to have a recommend. His reaction was awesome! He shared a lot of his experiences with various faith crises from his life and questions that he’s had. He had the idea of starting a Temple Prep class, specifically for members who had been through the temple but had questions or issues with it, so we could ask more pointed questions than we’d be able to in Sunday School, or in a Temple Prep class with people who were preparing to go through for the first time. I was pretty excited about that. Then the bishopric changed. The new bishop is a lot more of a straight arrow, and doesn’t understand at all. He put me in a Temple Prep class, but with a new member. I didn’t want to sit there and ask questions with this new member sitting there, who had never been through the temple, so I stopped going. I’ve been doing a ton of research about temples, hebrew symbolism and rituals, etc. This led to research on masonic rites and rituals (which brought more confusion). That led to research on Joseph Smith, the authenticity of the Book of Mormon, polygamy/polyandry, Brigham Young, etc., etc. In short, the more research I’ve done, the more I’ve seen the polish come off of the church and it’s past leaders.
I’ve learned that the church and the gospel of Jesus Christ are two very different things, and don’t always go hand-in-hand. I’ve actually felt quite a bit of relief since I let the temple recommend expire, stopped wearing garments, and came clean with my wife (who doesn’t completely understand but has become more supportive as time has gone on). I don’t feel like I’m living as a hypocrite anymore, trying to put on the TBM face while doubting everything. If it wasn’t for the kids, I would have stopped going to church, but I know it’s a good place for them to be. Right now, my own personal opinion is that Joseph Smith was an incredible con-man, and that Brigham Young was one of the most power-hungry and manipulative people of the 19th century. I look at the Book of Mormon similar to Aesop’s Fables; a book full of good stories with a good moral, but by no means true. However, I do accept Jesus Christ as my Savior. I believe he died for our sins, and that we can return to our Heavenly Father, because of Christ’s atonement. I believe the gospel is true, but that the church is not. I hope that makes sense. I think the LDS church has as much (or as little) truth as any other church I could attend, so it’s easiest for me to keep going to the LDS church to avoid stirring things up for my wife and kids.
Now, hopefully, I’ll be able to keep that going and ‘stay LDS’ by having all of you to share my thoughts and feelings with. I’ve really enjoyed your posts and points-of-view, so I’m optimistic that I’ve found a great place to learn and share from other analytic thinkers.
Must. Not. Make. Joke. with. User. Name. Holy cow, that was hard.
😳 Welcome! I hope we can continue to be a good source of support for you.
Love the username too! Mooooocho gracios for the post. In could have written 75% of it. Welcome! Sent from my XT1080 using Tapatalk
Welcome, glad you found us. I think one of the greatest values of this site is finding that we’re not alone. That’s also a huge step in transitioning and staying LDS. I agree with much of what you have said, and recognizing that the gospel and the church are separate is a huge win for you. I can say pretty much the same thing – I also believe Christ is my Savior and that the gospel is true, but the church is not. I look forward to hearing more from you. Great post and great story. I’m sure lots of our forum can relate, including me. Welcome to the site! Welcome, I’m glad to hear your voice join the choir. Welcome! I agree with a fair amount of your analysis about JS and BY. I don’t have a testimony of Christ (I claim agnosticism on most everything) though I have hope in eternal community and progression. I too am working on balancing those views with being a pretty active member.
I hope we can all help you in your journey and you can help us as well.
-SBRed
Welcome! I also very much relate to a lot of what you express. When I read the following I remember my past: Holy Cow wrote:… If it wasn’t for the kids, I would have stopped going to church, but I know it’s a good place for them to be. Right now, my own personal opinion is that Joseph Smith was an incredible con-man, and that Brigham Young was one of the most power-hungry and manipulative people of the 19th century. I look at the Book of Mormon similar to Aesop’s Fables; a book full of good stories with a good moral, but by no means true.
I can recall the day when I was right there, I would have said those exact things. It may or may not interest you that today I have different words to express my views. Not only different words but different feelings behind them. After continued research into JS and BY I again see areas where their good intentions are undeniable, even with their obvious human failings. I don’t feel a need to preach that the BoM is historical, but the words “it isn’t true” do not feel sincere from me. I guess you could say I have come to appreciate broader realms of spiritual truth, even a broader definition of “truth” that I feel allows people to experience what they do without trying to shoe-horn their personal experience into the context of my own. It has been liberating and elevating — from my experience.
Maybe what I am trying to say is if you are open to experiencing the road ahead there is much to see. Glad to have you with us!
Thanks, everybody! It’s great to find a place where it’s okay to have different perspectives and opinions. There isn’t just ONE way of seeing things, and that’s a refreshing feeling! Welcome from one of the resident curmudgeons. Welcome Holy Cow. Thanks for your introduction. I don’t believe JS was a con-man at all. But I have come to understand that line of thinking. More importantly, I’ve come to understand how much the truth we perceive relies greatly on our point of view, or experience, and many factors unique and personal to us. I believe there is truth. I believe Joseph was seeking it. I believe a lot of good has come of it.
I’m interested…have you read Rough Stone Rolling? If so, I’d love to hear your thoughts on it. I liked the approach Bushman took…showing how puzzling early history and JS was. Facinating!
Thanks for coming out of lurk-dom and joining the conversation. I look forward to learning from your posts.
Heber13 wrote:
I’m interested…have you read Rough Stone Rolling? If so, I’d love to hear your thoughts on it. I liked the approach Bushman took…showing how puzzling early history and JS was. Facinating!
Hey Heber, No I haven’t read Rough Stone Rolling yet. It’s next on my list of books to read. I’m reading In Sacred Loneliness right now, and I’m going to start Rough Stone Rolling next. I have read An Insider’s View of Mormon Origins, and found that to be pretty interesting, but with a negative bias. I really liked B.H. Roberts’ Studies of the Book of Mormon.
I completely understand what you’re saying about Joseph Smith, though. Even after I started to study the church’s history, and some of the things that can be a shock at first, I kept telling myself that Joseph Smith could still be a prophet, and he just made a mistake on this issue or that. But after doing that so many times, I finally had to tell myself to stop making excuses for him and just to look at him for what history shows him to be. And obviously, that will be a perspective that will vary for different people. Like you said, it depends on your point of view. And con-man was probably too strong a word for me to use. I believe he really did believe that he was sent by God to lead the church, but I also believe that there were things that didn’t come from God, but came from Joseph’s own creation, like the Book of Mormon, temple ceremonies, polygamy, most of the D&C and Pearl of Great Price. But, my wife completely accepts him as a prophet, and accepts everything he ever did and said, and I think that’s just fine. I know that what I believe (and don’t believe) can be very different than what other’s believe, and I don’t try to push my own skepticism on anybody.
Thanks for the welcome!
Great response!! I really liked this part:
Holy Cow wrote:I kept telling myself that Joseph Smith could still be a prophet, and he just made a mistake on this issue or that. But after doing that so many times, I finally had to tell myself to stop making excuses for him and just to look at him for what history shows him to be.
I totally agree with you. It almost seems there is a legend of Joseph that he walked 10 feet above the earth, he was so holy. And yet…while I can understand reverence for a prophet…it seems better for us to really cast him like he is in reality, not as if he was greater than he really was.
Like the old saying goes:
Quote:Catholics claim the pope is infallible, but catholics don’t really believe it. Mormons claim prophets are fallible, but mormons don’t really believe it.
I have found it much better for me to learn the facts and accept him as he is, not prop him up, but adjust my view of what prophets are, and accept what they are not. It has helped me find deeper meaning and actually, have greater appreciation for what they’ve accomplished.
You seem to fit in well with this group.
I have been reading Rough Stone Rolling. It’s created another cycle of evolution for my relationship with the church. The parts that have me most confused are his relationship with Fanny Alger who was somewhere between 14 and 16 years of age. It was classic adultery in my view. She was helping out at the Smith home, was attractive and had a nice personality. Historical records indicate that she was well-liked by just about all men. Joseph was probably attracted to her. Emma found Joseph and Fanny “in the barn” and things erupted. Oliver Cowdrey called it a dirty, nasty business, and Joseph never denied a “relationship” — but claimed it wasn’t adultery because they were married — not legally, but in a religious ceremony. Eventually Emma turfed her out…Fanny didn’t follow the saints or the LDS movement, moved out of state, got married, and had at least 8 kids. She was tight lipped and refused to talk about Joseph Smith in later years.
I believe this was the genesis of plural marriage here. The same thing Charlie Chaplin apparently did (according to my wife, I haven’t verified this)– he really liked young girls and married them rather than be charged with crime. Joseph Smith was extremely handsome and charismatic, and I think he really did believe he was a prophet. Also, even when he was young, he seemed to have an ability to convince people he had some kind of supernatural ties — belief that transformed into faith. This laid the foundation for the believability of plural marriage as a doctrinal point in Mormonism. After Joseph, I think the practice caught hold for a number of reasons. First, it certainly provides variety to men in a plural relationship. I can see men in tolerable, but unhappy relationships welcoming the idea. It provides diversity of skills in raising large family and most important, it fuels internal growth in the church due to the increased birth rate. The survival of the church was hugely important in our history, and I see plural marriage as a supportive practice for internal growth — a nice complement to the missionary effort and consistent with organizational ego centrism.
Given my own history, I find it rather disheartening, and perhaps even unbelievable that God would work through a man who used doctrine to justify libido. I hate to say this, but the thought occurred to me several times — in the Elizabeth Smart case, isn’t this what her kidnapper did? Took this underage girl and married her in a non-legal, religious ceremony, and then had a physical relationship? I would think that God would have higher standards in a prophet than this — particularly given His foreknowledge.
Yet people seem to believe in the restoration nonetheless. I have trouble accepting that Joseph smith made these mistakes, but was a valid prophet anyway.
Much confusion…
And then there is this — testimony. Yes — I have felt the spirit. Yes, there have been times when I have not been “worthy” of a temple recommend and things weren’t right in my life from a church perspective. During those times, I spoke and taught in church. During the throes of a period like this, one Bishop told me “I’m not worried about you, because I always feel the Spirit when you speak”. One person told me years ago I have “a gift” for creating a spiritual atmosphere when i talk. I know what i do — I look for elements of any situation that are touching –that show self-sacrifice, that build faith that someone is watching over us, and use the 7 ways of inviting the Spirit Gene R. Cooke taught me on my mission. I use carefully crafted phrases when its time to bring the talk or lesson to a critical point, and I use confidence.
Is it possible Joseph Smith had a much amplified gift like this? And that gave him the ability to persuade others, and lead a movement, in spite of lacking the sexual purity God apparently requires of us to have access to his power? And this gift gave him the believability necessary to cover his appetite for women in a way that preserved his standing as a prophet? These are the questions running through my mind right now.
Someone once said “it’s easy to believe in a dead prophet, and hard to believe in a living prophet”. I would argue that given the general memberships’ willingness to believe in JS in spite of this history above, this maxim is true:
“it’s easy to forgive the misdeeds of a historical prophet, and hard to forgive the sins of a current prophet”…can you imagine how the church would bleed members if current prophets had engaged in the sexual practices Joseph Smith did?
Reminds me of a comment I saw on a blog. It was something along the lines of, “Most members can handle the prophet not being perfect, but not THAT imperfect.” I was intentionally trying to work through several other issues with my FC before I dove into polygamy, but then all the essays came out the blogernacle exploded on the subject. I still don’t think I have reached my final stance and have more study to do. but my take at the moment is that I am not going to tell God that polygamy is wrong, but I am also not being told that I have to accept it or even state that I thought it was OK. Nowhere in any temple recommend interview do I have to even say that I think polygamy was ever OK (in fact it hints if I sympathize or support any polygamous group my recommend status is in question). So my stance now is that even if there are some situations it might be OK, I think the way it was implemented in the LDS church makes me sick.
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