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Hi friends, I’ve been reading posts for a while and thought it was time to jump in with y’all. I’m an active member, married in the temple, in the thick of guiding my kids into adulthood without messing them up too much, and trying to figure out my place in the church.
I have held lots of leadership positions and been very active in the church my entire life. For as long as I can remember, however, I have been aware and upset by the sexism in the church. Other blows to my faith over the past few years have allowed me to really confront my feelings about how the church is organized and run and I’ve found myself livid over some of the injustices. For a long while I’ve been considering leaving, making a statement with my feet. But I honestly do love the church, despite its serious flaws, and I really love the LDS people.
I’m holding out hope that there is still a place for me here, that my voice is useful and important. I am redefining my relationship with the church and feel I can possibly make a difference, that hearts can change and that I can make things better for those around me. I have been teetering on the edge of just giving up my activity and last week the 2nd counselor in the bishopric asked me to speak in SM. He told me the bishop felt inspired to have me speak about the Young Women’s theme. I’m not sure they knew what they were getting into. I laid it all out, the modesty problems, the abuse problems, many of the sexism problems, but I used scripture and approved quotes to back me up. So many women thanked me for what I’d said – so maybe there is a space for me to belong still.
What I am wondering from many of you is, are you able to (or are you interested in) keep a temple recommend? My DH was recently denied his because he was honest in telling the bishop he no longer believed the church was absolutely true anymore. He’s okay in everything else. I would like to keep my TR but also have doubts about the restoration. I want to be honest and live with integrity, but I really don’t think having doubts should keep me from the temple. Our bishop is rather new and definitely adheres the the letter of the law (crap!) rather than the spirit.
And thank you for all you share here – it is a blessing to me!
Hi Tadpole, Thanks for introducing your self.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you! for staying and trying to make a difference, if you can. Yes. We *NEED* a diverse orchestra of voices in our church. We need the reality check of an occasional person to look at things in a different way, and even to say “hey, wait a minute. this might not be right.” It doesn’t have to mean they are disloyal or unfaithful. It’s following another core Mormon concept — do what is right, let the consequence follow. We sing it in a hymn.
Temple recommend questions:
I always suggest our popular How-To article with lots of good ideas in general. There’s a section in it about temple recommends that a lot of people find helpful: “HOW TO STAY IN THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS AFTER A MAJOR CHALLENGE TO YOUR FAITH”
http://staylds.com/docs/HowToStay.html Some of us maintain temple recommends. Some don’t. It’s really up to you and your comfort level. We rarely find it helpful to unload the full confession of controversies on your local BP or SP. Especially if you are complying with the “action” temple recommend questions IMO, the belief one’s are intentionally vague and can be nuanced. Bottom line though is you have to be comfortable and feel worthy for it to be a good experience in the temple anyway.
I feel worthy and comfortable. I actually like the concept of the temple more after spending a great deal of time and effort learning how it developed. But for other reasons, I have not bothered with maintaining a temple recommend for over 8 years. My path works best for me. Others here will chime in about keeping one. I’m totally cool with that too.
Hey, and welcome. I’m glad you were able to find this site and hope you’ll find it helpful over the long haul. I have. Regarding the TR interview, if you haven’t already done so, consider reading through
this articleEdit — I see Brian beat me to it. That’s two recommendations, so it must be a good article.
Welcome, and thanks for sharing your story. I think you’ll find many here in this group that feel similar to you about things. Regarding the TR, I still have a current recommend and have gone to the temple a couple times this year and enjoy the peaceful feelings I feel there, and also see how symbolic the temple ceremony is in so many ways, that there is so much potential to draw on it from so many angles.
My bishop is very letter of the law, a great guy with a great heart, but has started to challenge my views as wanting me to embrace more orthodox, traditional views, or threatens that he may not be able to renew the recommend for me when the time comes. That’s ok. I can see that is about him and what he thinks is right. He is trying to do what’s right, I just happen to disagree about some things, and that’s ok too.
If the temple is about getting closer to God, I like To try to keep my recommend and use it for that. However, if I can’t go to the temple, I believe I can get closer to God in other locations (mountains, nature, home, etc), so I do not fear not having a recommend, I just try to keep mine as long as I can. That’s been my approach so far.
I’m glad you joined our group and came out of lurking.
Tadpole, the title of your introduction is similar to the way I felt at the beginning. Overtime it gets better. You’re at a good place. Keep coming back.
Welcome.
Mike from Milton.
Welcome, Tadpole. I second Brian’s recommendation for the link. It’s a great article to help you think about what the TR questions mean to you personally. Thank you for the welcome and the recommendations! I’d read that essay months ago but forgotten about the temple recommend interview and tithing parts. There are some ideas there that will be useful to me. Welcome Tadpole, You have come to a familiar place here – we are all so different, yet so alike; kinda like humanity in general. I read a quote recently that said something about, “if you could read a book detailing the pains and sorrows of your enemies, it would be enough to disarm all hostilities.”
We are you, we are not you – We are in this together. Thank you for your conscious decision to continue in your contribution.
Tadpole wrote:I’m not sure they knew what they were getting into. I laid it all out, the modesty problems, the abuse problems, many of the sexism problems, but I used scripture and approved quotes to back me up. So many women thanked me for what I’d said
I’d be very interested in hearing your points on this topic. Perhaps, if you feel comfortable you could summarize them into bullet points and reply or post a more full version of the talk in a separate post.
Thanks!
Still don’t have much time, but I also want to welcome you officially. For now, I choose not to hold a TR. For me, it has been sort of liberating in that I feel truly able to live and worship according to the dictates of my own conscience. Without a TR the shoulds and expectations of me are far less. I have always been tapped for leadership and no longer feel enchanted with Church leadership given some of my recent experiences. I hope this will change, and it may well change, but not having a TR is good insulation about being asked to take on leadership positions I would have to go through the discomfort of refusing of refusing at this time. Again, I hope this will change, but not for now. I haven’t been open about this on this forum until now. But I’m feeling comfortable with the idea now that I feel I can say this is where I stand.
My wife would rather I have a TR, and my kids are a bit too young to know about or understand my choice. If this became an issue with any of them I would likely do what is necessary to get a TR after talking it out with my family
I am not encouraging anyone to make this choice of not holding a TR, but this is where I have come to rest for the time being.
Tadpole, you and I have some things in common, I can see. I have chosen to keep my recommend. I do not have any issues with answering the questions. When I go to the temple, it is beneficial to me. We were there recently with the majority of our grown children and inlaw children and it was a very happy day for me. I can remember thinking how glad I was to be able to experience that day in spite of all the issues I have with life in the church. We are all trying to stand in our places, however we do it. Welcome to this group. It has been a good thing for me and I feel sure it will be helpful to you too.
I would love to know what you shared in that sacrament meeting talk! Can you give us a little bit without giving away too much if you are trying to stay under the radar?
Afterall, you have expressed one of the great blessings of having a recommend and attending the temple…being there with people you love who want to be there. It is something to seriously consider when deciding to keep a recommend or not. In the temple, I felt God’s love. Using Mormon teachings and logic, if I feel good in the temple, God must be ok with me and where I’m at to send His Spirit to testify to me of His love and approval. Others may not approve of me, or may think I’m losing the spirit, or my mind is darkened, or whatever they want to think up about me, but all I know is God seems to be OK with my choices. So that’s good enough for me. Like I said, I think that holds true if I have a recommend or not. The recommends are just part of the earthly institutional system used to try to keep order to things, but it is not perfect or absolute, it’s just the system.
The system can create pain when families aren’t able to all be together in the temple under some circumstances. That becomes a reality. But I guess I know the conditions for holding the recommend, so I can choose to live by them or not live by them. I know what the church needs from me to approve of me and give a recommend. There is approval from God either way, IMO. They are different things…approval from God and approval from the church.
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