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I was reflecting on the common advice that to avoid apostasy, inactivity, or losing one’s faith or testimony, one must pray, read the scriptures, fast regularly, etcetera. I’m curious– when you really hit your own trial of faith — were you doing those things in reasonable doses? Is it really that simple if you want to maintain a testimony and avoid leaving the Church?
I believe I was doing all those things in reasonable doses. Like any simple explanation, it will often miss the full complexity of life. If you have any interest in the full range of my thoughts at the time PM me and I’ll give you the link. It’s fairly long and involved and few people have the interest, but I have shared it with a couple who have found value so I’ll make it available to the truly interested. Strangely enough, those exact practices are sometimes what leads someone into crisis. I am not saying they are bad ideas, but some people lose their faith exactly when they are trying too hard not to. These are the stories of people who were seeking a spiritual confirmation and felt like they did not receive it. That or the people doing those things, and then feeling the emotional feelings they associate with the spirit when experiencing something outside those activities (like a great movie, or great music) It was diving into the scriptures deeper than ever that was part of the beginning of my faith crisis. I was trying to understand who goes to which kingdom and studying the D&C with a fine-toothed comb. I haven’t picked up the scriptures much since that time 2 years ago. I have found that the scriptures create angst in me because of the paradoxes that I now see. As I’ve been able to see the scriptures in a more metophorical light I’m slowly allowing myself to read them again but I am not worrying about getting my daily scripture study in. I read the scriptures when I feel moved to do so and not on a rigid schedule. I’ve done the same with prayer. I hope to have prayer back in my life but at this point it is very sporadic (though we still have consistent family prayer). I’m renegotiating my spiritual life and I’m very happy with the results. I stopped praying when I came to the conclusion that I’d not ever received an answer and was unlikely to receive one and that the difficulties I was having couldn’t be explained away. I still read the bible but not the BoM , D&C, or the Pof GP. Even though the the teachings are Christian and moral I just don’t believe the historicity and claims as to origin. It became harder and harder to teach so I just gave it up. There’s still plenty of reasons for me to stay but they tend to be more”practical” as Ray would say. I am a convert. I had doubts throughout all the years I have been a member. So I finally decided I would read the Book of Mormon and get an answer once and for all. I read it in two weeks. I was fasting the last day planning on getting an answer. But none came. I was still ok with that thinking I would get an answer later. So I continued to read and pray and fast when I had the feeling to look online for answers. That is when I read all the history of the church and went through hell. I’ve calmed down since then especially since finding StayLDS. I haven’t been to the temple for a year and half and my temple recommend has expired. I’m not sure I will try to renew it. I still hold my stake calling in the R.S. I don’t believe the church is the one and only true church on the earth but I stay because of my family and because I love them. But it is very very hard and lonely. I’m amazed at the answers here. I honestly thought I’d hear people say they had gotten away from it all and were not “nourishing the spirit”….but to find you were actually doing all those things and that it CREATED a trial of faith is interesting, and again thought-rocking. SilentDawning wrote:I was reflecting on the common advice that to avoid apostasy, inactivity, or losing one’s faith or testimony, one must pray, read the scriptures, fast regularly, etcetera.
I’m curious– when you really hit your own trial of faith — were you doing those things in reasonable doses? Is it really that simple if you want to maintain a testimony and avoid leaving the Church?
Actually, I think reading the scriptures too much and praying about it is exactly what led me to really start doubting the Church. The more official Church publications I read the more I started to think that many of the Church’s claims just didn’t make sense and it looked to me like their story was not in sync with reality. If I hadn’t been reading the scriptures and thinking about the Church so much I might have believed in all the traditional Mormon doctrines forever.
I think the mission field is an exception in some cases because missionaries are young and often surrounded by other enthusiastic believers so it is easier for them to read the scriptures everyday and feel strengthened by it. More education and life experience definitely made it harder for me to continue to accept some of the assumptions the Church expects members to believe. Even so, I was completely inactive for many years but still believed in the Church in the back of my mind and then I started to attend Church again and had a calling when I really started to take more interest in some of the details of what the Church teaches.
I shrugged off some of the worst anti-Mormon propaganda I stumbled onto about the Book of Abraham and Joseph Smith marrying young teenagers and other men’s wives for over 10 years mostly because I wanted to believe in the Church and doubting it made me depressed. So I assumed these accusations were mostly lies and after that I deliberately avoided any anti-Mormon propaganda until I had basically come to the conclusion mostly on my own that I just didn’t believe the Church was really what it claimed to be. That’s why my advice to people that really want to continue believing in the Church would be to not worry about it too much and mostly just focus on any positive feelings about the Church instead. You might not like what you find if you start to look at everything too closely.
DA – I agree with you. The mission field is an insulator against this stuff. I was VERY active and excited about the church, and doing all the right things (prayer, scripture study, callings, meditating for hours about spiritual topics) when I had my faith crash. I was ticked, because I felt like I had never been so spiritual and excited about god and religion, and then to have “this” happen. What did I do wrong? What LDS adivce did I not follow? It wasn’t suppose to be like this — it’s not what they teach in SS. In SS, they tell you if you do all these things, you will be fine and safe and won’t leave the church…. I don’t think so. Peaceandjoy wrote:So I finally decided I would read the Book of Mormon and get an answer once and for all. I read it in two weeks. I was fasting the last day planning on getting an answer. But none came. I was still ok with that thinking I would get an answer later. So I continued to read and pray and fast when I had the feeling to look online for answers. That is when I read all the history of the church and went through hell. I’ve calmed down since then especially since finding StayLDS. I haven’t been to the temple for a year and half and my temple recommend has expired. I’m not sure I will try to renew it. I still hold my stake calling in the R.S. I don’t believe the church is the one and only true church on the earth but I stay because of my family and because I love them. But it is very very hard and lonely.
A couple of months ago Spock started a thread about why should one pray to know if the BoM is true if there is only one possible answer? It was great discussion. I recommend you read it. What does one do when they get an answer about the BoM besides the “traditional” “yes, it is true?”
I like your comments PJ, and can relate. I’m living on an expired TR — and still holding a calling that, according to the CHI, I cannot have without it. Eventually it will come to a head, and unfortunately my opportunity to serve within the church and the members in the branch will be drastically reduced.
Yep, it is hard and lonely—my TBM family has been unable to reconcile and deal with my faith crisis. They are quite “bitter” and judgmental. It’s very very sad.
“Such is life in this fallen sphere – the caravan moves on.”
I really think some people simply are wired to accept more easily and others are wired to question and/or struggle. That wiring gets covered for periods of time, but, in the end, it usually surfaces. Interestingly, I was on the other end of the spectrum when I had my strongest experiences forming a lasting relationship with the Church and forging much of what is my own testimony. I served a mission and had some great experiences, but it was at college that I learned the most about my own perspective – my own personal faith.
I took a number of classes at the Harvard Divinity School, and I was deeply impressed by a few things:
1) “Fundamentals of Christian Theology” just didn’t resonate with me – AT ALL. The class was taught by a renowned Catholic theologian, and he did a wonderful job teaching the “fundamentals” (and was an excellent teacher). I loved him and his class, but the actual “fundamentals” themselves did absolutely nothing for me. There were so many “WTH” moments, and it really crystalized in my own mind the difference between what I had come to understand as “pure Mormonism” and what these brilliant, dedicated, faithful Christians believed and taught. It was a real Zen slap for me, if I can mix metaphors.
2) I took a class called “Jesus and the Moral Life” from Harvey Cox – the author of “The Secular City” and one of the icons of liberation theology. In that class, I read a couple of books that had a profound effect on me – ironically, by re-inforcing the distinction I saw between the Gospel, the Church and church culture.
3) I had a couple of Master’s level seminars that were small group with lots of one-on-one interaction with faculty and Doctoral candidates that were real eye-openers – introductions to not only “mainstream Christianity” but also lots of movements within “fringe Christianity” – like gay theology and feminst theology. Again, ironically, I had a vision of how these fringe theologies actually could fit into pure Mormonism that was amazing.
It was the “meta-level vision”, if you will, that was strengthened in these classes that gave me “outside confirmation” of my own testimony.
My most recent trial of faith happened when I was serving actively as a priesthood leader. There was a Bishop here who had the same experience…. I was actively reading and fasting and all that stuff, and then for a while after being frustrated I also stopped doing all that. I don’t think either proved right or wrong for me, it just taught me to let go of trying to control things that are out of my control, and instead focus on things I can control, and then I realized I like reading and praying to control those controllables. I think God wants us to experience some things, and keep our hearts at a good place throughout the experience, however we can do that. It varies by person, perhaps like what Ray mentioned, we are wired differently so different approaches are sometimes needed. Many people I talk to get through their experience with intense prayer and scripture reading, some actually get pushed away by being told to focus on that too much. There is no “one way”, IMO.
During the begining and most fragile time of my faith crisis I probably prayed on a GA level. 
I found when I stopped with the Do better, better, better …. In prayer, reading whatever .. that I could actually balance and ponder my thoughts in a much healthier spiritual way. Taking on prayer and sricpture reading in the manner that I did (which is what I was told to do) was unhealthy, too time consuming and damaging. Thank goodness I let myself breath … Or I might have never been at peace like I am today!
Those methods might work for someone that has minimal doubt .. and just needs some sort of boost.
It is definitely not a one size fits all method! And the promises that come with … Well if you do this and this and this with more honesty and more obedience, you will believe ….. Is a dangerous promise. Not everyone can handle that kind of dissapointment when it doesn’t happen for them. Luckily I can handle just about anything.
I think it’s possible to remain in stage 3 for life if one attends church, feels welcome there, prays, and limits their scripture study to the “scripture mastery” scriptures. I put that last caveat in there because I think most stage 3 members would be shocked if they read the entire canon with any degree of thought. In my case, I was doing all of the standard Sunday School answers, but after we moved to Utah I started clashing with others at church and felt quite unwelcome. What I saw at church and the way I was treated didn’t square with my notions of Christian love and charity. Then when I was twelve I read the BOM from cover to cover for the first time. I have a naturally pacifist bent, and all of the violence was deeply unsettling. I had a difficult time reconciling Nephi committing murder, or the Nephites going Jeffrey Dahmer on the Lamanites in 4 Nephi. Then I got my first taste of un-whitewashed church history in the book “the Mormon Murders”, and the rest is history. I wasn’t looking for anti material, and I was still doing the Sunday School plan up to that point. I wonder with the advent of the Internet if it’s going to be possible for people to live their whole lives without uncovering something disturbing.
Zealous scripture study, prayer, and intention were part of the foundation of my glorious faith supernova. But to pinpoint the key foundation, I think I would point at my increasing success at seeing/considering all other people like unto myself (having my eye filled with the reality of You). p.s.
Steve-hpias wrote:I have a naturally pacifist bent, and all of the violence was deeply unsettling. I had a difficult time reconciling Nephi committing murder, or the Nephites going Jeffrey Dahmer on the Lamanites in 4 Nephi. Then I got my first taste of un-whitewashed church history in the book “the Mormon Murders”, and the rest is history.
It sounds like you are a fellow “morality unconvert”; we transcended out of moral need.
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