Innoculation

[Anonymous]

I just listened to the MormonMatters podcast about innoculation (I think it was episode # 13). I was genuinely pained by how the apologists involved spoke down to all of us who have had doubts. I was innoculated early. I was BIC to very intelligent parents who taught me about a lot of the church wackiness like polygamy, masons, etc. I also am an avid reader, including church history. Most of the history has not shocked me. My problem came when I started really thinking about the history and core docrines as they applied to me specifically. That is when my stage 4 crisis came. So, I have concluded that innoculation will not shield many of us from the stage 4 angst or doubts. Why, then, should anyone be innoculated? If my parents did their best to innoculate me and I still ended up in a crisis of faith which may well be damaging to me where the church is concerned, is there any hope for my children who are being raised unorthodox and being innoculated early?

I really disliked how the apologists were so dismissive of everyone who doubts. That is so unfair. I did know. I did read. I did think. I did have a testimony. I still do all these things. Is it really my fault that some of it has caused serious enough cognitive dissonance that I would no longer be able to shelf it all? It really makes me think that the church membership would be better off if doubters would just make a graceful exit. I mean, the stage 3 membership is uncomfortable with doubters and the apologists just want us to get over it. Is that good for the church?

[Anonymous]

I think this has been brought up before, but it would be good for someone in general conference to talk about their own personal struggles and doubts in a big way, instead of the usual “if you follow the commandments, you’ll believe” or “belief in my family goes back ten generations” etc.

I think a lot of people could do with this. I suspect most church members have had doubts or struggles, but that they don’t feel that they can voice them, or the problem becomes worse, and they end up either damaged or leaving.

[Anonymous]

My parents inoculated me to the extreme. It worked for many years but finally began to break down. To me personally it is not a matter of inoculation or believing. I just want to know what the truth is. If Joseph was a real prophet dispite all the wackiness I am perfectly willing to accept that. I will accept every detail of Mormonism if I can know it is true. Yes I have prayed, studied, lived the commandments. Nothing has given me the conviction to say it is all true. So then I am left with my intelligence to figure things out. Which leads me to believe after looking at the facts and thinking about it logically it is mostly myth, from the Bible to The Book Of Mormon.

I a starting to believe there are 3 groups.

Those that will believe no matter what.

Those who will question, think, and have doubts

Those who do not care at all.

Inoculation only works on the first group for a sustained period of time. Then they would believe anyway so why bother. Beyond that I think it is just dishonest not tell the truth. And it is more than dishonest to cover it up.

[Anonymous]

Cadence wrote:

I a starting to believe there are 3 groups.

Those that will believe no matter what.

Those who will question, think, and have doubts

Those who do not care at all.

Inoculation only works on the first group for a sustained period of time. Then they would believe anyway so why bother. Beyond that I think it is just dishonest not tell the truth. And it is more than dishonest to cover it up.

I question, think and have doubts — and REALLY REALLY wish I could go back to “believing no matter what” or at least “not caring at all” — but those days are long gone. At least that way the “cover up” would fester so badly.

[Anonymous]

I think there are two creations for everything, the spiritual/mental/planning/teaching creation, and the physical/actual creation.

So as much as parents try to innoculate or prepare kids for things, it eventually still becomes a real struggle for an individual and it will be painful and disturbing to figure it out for oneself. The struggle is the experience we need.

Ella Menno wrote:

So, I have concluded that innoculation will not shield many of us from the stage 4 angst or doubts. Why, then, should anyone be innoculated? If my parents did their best to innoculate me and I still ended up in a crisis of faith which may well be damaging to me where the church is concerned, is there any hope for my children who are being raised unorthodox and being innoculated early?

My guess is there is still some value in knowing your parents tried. Perhaps that is the only hope parents can have, in telling their children…”you’re gonna have to take the walk of fire sometime in your life when you are ready for it…as much as we try to prepare you for it and support you through it, it is your experience… and we can’t walk it for you.”

[Anonymous]

I think it helps to realize that not everyone in the Church is a black-and-white thinker who knows nothing of the issues that can lead someone into a crisis. My kids know I don’t agree with everything that is said over the pulpit (at all levels) and that I see lots of things differently than many members (including leaders), but they know I still am active and dedicated and faithful as a member – and I think it helps them to know that.

Would your crisis have been easier if you had totally blind-sided without any preparation by your parents?

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the responses. I really don’t know if it would have been harder or easier without the prior knowledge. Stage 4 is what it is. It may be that if I had been raised by purely TBM parents with no inoculation I would never have questioned because I would have avoided “the mere appearance of evil” in the form of anything that made me uncomfortable with the current church teachings. I am drawn to the wackiness and the wackiness makes me alternately uncomfortable and fascinated. I want to do what’s right for my kids but I don’t want them looking back saying my lack of faith destroyed them for whatever reason, but I also want to be true to myself and what I feel to be right. Thanks for listening. Sorry, I think I put this thread in the wrong area initially. Oops.

[Anonymous]

Growing up I knew that church history wasn’t all rosy but I didn’t know a lot of the details. By the time I was a teenager, I understood that the church practiced polygamy and Brigham Young had a bunch of wives and Joseph had many wives also. I knew that blacks were denied the priesthood and was given the usual explanations for that. I was about 15 when I first heard the Joseph Smith ran for the U.S. Presidency. Basically, I knew that Church history was complex and not all good.

Then as an adult when I spent time learning much more of church history, it definitely shifted my perspective on some issues. But I already understood that church history was complex and now I was learning the complexities. The negative aspects of church history do not bother me a lot. So for me, I think my mild inoculation worked for me if not being too bothered by church history is the goal. No one ever sat me down and spelled out polyandry or peep stones or treasure hunting. But I knew that JS practiced polygamy, the BoM translation process was weird, and that JS wasn’t very well trusted by his contemporaries for reasons other than his religious claims.

I also have tons of doubts. I mostly don’t care about the church history stuff because that doesn’t affect me now, but there’s not much in the church that I really feel certain about. But I balance out my doubts with my beliefs and they make up my complex self. But I think that understanding the complexities of church history early in life help me now feel at peace with the complexity of my own religious beliefs now.

I hope that I explained this well enough so that y’all can understand my perspective on inoculation.

[Anonymous]

Inoculation is an interesting concept. I think it’s important to remember that vaccines are not a cure-all. For the majority of people, vaccines prevent polio, whooping cough, pertussis, dpitheria, hepatitis, and a host of maladies. But vaccines don’t prevent AIDS, pneumonia, a broken arm, or even the common cold. So, I think that it’s important to remember that inoculations can’t inoculate us from everything. Life is full of trials. There must needs be an opposition in all things. Those that hold on to the iron rod, despite the mists of darkness, will be rewarded with the tree of life.

I have been lucky NOT to have a crisis of faith that so many here have had. I empathize with each of you who struggle so mightily. I have had my struggles. My brother died 4 years ago in a traffic accident, leaving behind a seriously injured wife, and 2 seriously injured children. I struggled with the Family Proclamation which says every child is entitled to be raised by a mother AND father, yet God took away a wonderful father. These kids have struggled without their father, no question.

I really thank John Dehlin for inoculating me against some of the church history issues, but nothing he has talked about could possibly have prepared me for dealing with my brother’s death. Inoculation is a tool, not a cure-all, and I think it’s important to remember that. We all struggle with certain things, and when the mists of darkness come, I hope that communities such as this can help us through these tough times. Ella Menno, I pray for you, and hope your current struggles “are but a small moment.”

I have enjoyed Rix’s comments here. I think he is one who has struggled mightily through these mists of darkness, and has come out a stronger man. None of us like some of the challenges we face. When I look at my brother’s death, sometimes I would like to take back all I’ve learned in the past 4 years to have him back. But that is not my choice; the reality is that I have become a better person because of this trial, though it has been far from easy for me. If our foresight was as good as our hindsight, I think we wouldn’t worry so much about our current trials.

[Anonymous]

Old-Timer wrote:

but they know I still am active and dedicated and faithful as a member – and I think it helps them to know that.

This caught my attention, Ray. Can you expand on why you think that this knowledge helps your kids?

[Anonymous]

I haven’t listened to those MormonMatters panel podcasts in a long time. I can’t remember much of the details, perhaps I will go download them and refresh my memory.

Just to add in a touch of history and perspective on those:

The MM podcasts were an idea that didn’t go very far. They were also produced during a time period when the MM site purpose was sort of drifting around in different directions (my personal observation). The staff of bloggers has changed a lot since then, also the “management” behind the scenes. Several more focused internet Mormonism projects developed out of that boiling cauldron of a time period.

[Anonymous]

Nothing can prepare you for the questionable things in church history or the behaviour of leaders if you don’t have something in your spiritual bank to balance it out. It’s like an old fashioned balance scale where you can put the questions on one side and the things you’ve felt were spiritual experiences on the other. Another way to look at is being “church broke”. My first wife worked at the church office building and said you were “church broke” if you could work there and still believe the church is true.

I thought I was ok until things started coming into view about church history and doctrine starting with going to the temple without any preparation in the 60’s and then in school in the 70’s after leaving BYU. The problem is that once somethings come into question, it’s a short slide for everything. You don’t trust what you thought you felt and relying on others faith is not enough anymore. Once you’re overdrawn on the bank there’s no way to make deposits without being able to explain away the problems and that’s not likely to happen

[Anonymous]

I agree with GB about what happens when you are church broke. A very large reason why I can be at peace is related more to spiritual experiences in my life than to innoculation – and the fact that I have built up lots of social capital over the years. Being exposed to lots of things in my upbringing and being accepted as a naturally heterodox thinker by my parents and church leaders played a definite part, but it’s my own experiences that are the fall-cushion, if you will. So, I have not only social capital, but I also have Gospel capital – and that’s important.

That’s one of the main reasons I believe in extended activity while working through concerns. It’s MUCH harder to remain involved in some way, active and/or believing if you withdraw from the source of church-specific deposits. However, I understand totally if someone needs to withdraw for a time, get their own balance restored spiritually and then work on gaining church-related capital again – especially if their account is in the red. It’s just hard for many to return in a constructive and productive way if they zero out their account reactively when their crisis first starts.

[Anonymous]

Old-Timer wrote:

It’s MUCH harder to remain involved in some way, active and/or believing if you withdraw from the source of church-specific deposits. However, I understand totally if someone needs to withdraw for a time, get their own balance restored spiritually and then work on gaining church-related capital again – especially if their account is in the red. It’s just hard for many to return in a constructive and productive way if they zero out their account reactively when their crisis first starts.

I agree Ray…however I did find in my situation what helped me the most was taking a few weeks off of church, and replacing it…or trading up…to immersing myself in Buddhist teachings and also in nature.

I’m not sure why that made a difference, because the church historical issues were all still there, the church members that bug me were all still there, God was still not answering my prayers…all that was still the same…and church was not providing me with spiritual experiences to replenish my account. Then it was like I was infused with a new source of spiritual strength from an outside influence that I was not able to get by continuing to go to church and dig in my heels and force my faith within mormonism.

So, while I agree that you need to continue to stay active and/or believing…sometimes that means allowing yourself to be influenced from where ever you find enlightenment, and then you have a positive spiritual account balance to be able to return to mormonism and again see all the wonderful things you still like about it.

Inoculation will not prevent all sicknesses, nor will mormonism provide all cures.

[Anonymous]

Heber13 wrote:

Inoculation will not prevent all sicknesses, nor will mormonism provide all cures.

LOVE this, Heber!

[Author]

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