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I have just recently started to really ask myself what I truly believe about the church. And I honestly don’t know what I actually believe. I am just scratching the surface of actual church history and it has been pretty disconcerting for me. Coming to the realization that what I have been taught my entire life is definitely not the whole story has really walloped me. I have recovered somewhat from the initial “my whole world view is falling apart” scare to trying to slow down and work through this rationally and prayerfully and that has helped. My fear is that as I learn more about the church and its imperfections that it is a hop skip and a jump to questioning Christianity itself and even God. I believe many people have been through this exact same scenario and was hoping for some direction on this journey. I feel like I definitely want and need God in my life in some form. How do you make your way through all your questions and doubts without completely losing faith?
I would suggest taking a step away from the history for a bit while you work out what theological concepts and principles you like or want to believe – recognizing that there might be NOTHING that is objectively provable as true or false. So, what do you WANT to believe?Figure that out, then figure out if or how that can fit within Mormonism. Some of my beliefs sound strange to many members, but they each can fit into my own view of “pure Mormonism” – even if others wouldn’t classify them that way. Leave “the Church” alone intellectually for a time while you focus on how you feel about “the Gospel” (the news you would consider to be good). Trudge52; many of us here have been there. Having people to talk to about it in a positive manner is the strength of this website. You are not alone. Trudge52 I have anquished alot over that myself lately as you might have read on my ‘tremendous cognitive dissoance” post recently. I had been watching the documentary of the JS papers CD’s my sister in law had sent me hoping it would give me some answers. When I watched the last disc on polygamy, it basically said there is so little information about that time accept for what some of the women who lived polygamy wrote that we cannot answer much about this. It left me empty and I realized that unless God told me directly what doctrines and ordiances I should accept, I could not figure them out by myself. Well, I had a very spiritual experience early Sunday morning while I was still laying in bed. I woke up feeling so happy and peaceful. Suddenly, the words, “Zion is within” came into my head. Other thoughts started flooding my head then in regards to 1st Corinthians chp. 13. Namely, that even if we had all knowledge, it would mean nothing without charity. I could know all the doctrine and have all the saving ordiances done but be a jerk and it would mean nothing. Without knowing how to love others and myself, it would not benefit me. I realized then that it didn’t really matter if I ever knew the truth about church history etc. but who I am becoming and how I treat people is what matters the most. So, now my goal is to get to know Christ better and immulate Him in my actions and relationships with people.
I’ve started to think about my relationship with church (and church history) as much like a marriage. What would I do if my husband told me some things about his history that I hadn’t known before? Things that weren’t very flattering. I would be upset. I would feel deceived. I would be frustrated. But would I walk away from him? No, unless I was in danger or my children were I would not just be able to give up or walk away from my marriage. I have made covenants to him (just like we have made to the church) that I would not want to break. I know the benefits of staying married to him and that far outweighs the negative. (Oh, and the negative seems to happen a lot!) All too often we are expecting or have expectations from the church that it just cannot live up to nor should it be expected to.
So if you can see how my marriage/church analogy works it helps me to keep things in perspective. The church isn’t perfect and neither is my husband but the value from both exceeds the negative.
Old-Timer wrote:I would suggest taking a step away from the history for a bit while you work out what theological concepts and principles you like or want to believe – recognizing that there might be NOTHING that is objectively provable as true or false.
So, what do you WANT to believe?Figure that out, then figure out if or how that can fit within Mormonism. Some of my beliefs sound strange to many members, but they each can fit into my own view of “pure Mormonism” – even if others wouldn’t classify them that way. Leave “the Church” alone intellectually for a time while you focus on how you feel about “the Gospel” (the news you would consider to be good). As a follow-up to this, I have managed to stay in spite of my third trial of faith last fall. It did this by making a decision that I wanted to stay — to stay in spite of all the warts I see on the Church that have hurt me. That decision eclipses the history and all the other things I find objectionable about the Church, including my disbelief in certain aspects of it.
As a result of that pivotal decision to stay, I have found a number of reasons for staying that make sense to me personally that have little to do with the Standard Mormon Answers (SMA’s) you always hear, and which no longer resonate with me. For me, the decision to stay is like the hinge that directs the outward span of the gate. Maybe that can work for you too? Maybe not, but that’s OK. I put it out there as another way of coping which has stemmed the slippery slope for me personally.
Also, I still give some credibility to my spiritual experiences. The feelings of the Spirit are good, and when those feelings act on people, they do tend to make them more kind, more loving etcetera. Whether those feelings mean the “Church is True” is incidental to the fact that those feelings are good, and encourage others to do good. At one time, they HAD to mean the Church was true or they were unreliable….I no longer believe this. They mean good is happening, and having those good feelings at Church, with others, and during prayer, and while reading the Book of Mormon (whether it’s just good spiritual fiction, or what it claims to be) are all strengthening good experiences that help me take the edge off my personality and be kinder to others.
That is yet another reason that I have found for staying in the Church.
Here are my suggestions from my personal experience – * Do not expect perfection, and do not be upset by imperfection when you surely find it.
* Expect foul ups everywhere, in the present day, and in the past.
* Don’t hold historical figures up too high, because if you do, they’ll fall down the harder. Joseph Smith was an amazing man, but it turns out he had his faults too.
And finally, concentrate on what you think is good. Accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative. Well, most of the negative anyway – some genuine truths are hard/uncomfortable.
And if you think our church history is bad, have you looked at that of the Roman Catholic church? The “great and abominable church” thing in 1 Nephi certainly covers some of the atrocities it committed in the Middle Ages. It may have become better, and produced more beautiful culture, but the Church of Rome has a lot of blood on its hands.
Quote:Namely, that even if we had all knowledge, it would mean nothing without charity. I could know all the doctrine and have all the saving ordiances done but be a jerk and it would mean nothing. Without knowing how to love others and myself, it would not benefit me.
Amen sister!
What you are going through is very common, at least among those of us “wired” to pass through disaffection (or in Fowler terms, move on past a Synthetic-Conventional faith framework). There’s no rush. You can look at this as being scary or exciting, and really, it is both. It is common for people who begin to question the LDS Church (or any other religion they belonged to) to also start questioning the historical Jesus and even the existence of God. Not everyone goes this route, but many do.
The thing is this — you must tear down your old assumptions and expectations that are not working or did not work for you. That isn’t the end though. Once you purge yourself of the concepts and ideas that did not work for you, you can build up new ones that
DOwork. The powerful and exciting thing about all this is the new perspectives will be your own. They will not be ones that were handed to you, but they will be solid and based on what really does work for you. You can keep things that work. There’s nothing wrong with that. Use what is valuable, what speaks to your soul. Get rid of the ideas that were holding you back or distracting you from God.
You can go through this and even stay in the LDS Church. That’s pretty much the main thing we explore here. But really, the most important thing is to build really strong and personal meaning, deep connection to the universe and the divine that empower you, wherever that ends up being.
It’s scary, but I’ve never been happier also.
trudge52 wrote:I have just recently started to really ask myself what I truly believe about the church. And I honestly don’t know what I actually believe. I am just scratching the surface of actual church history and it has been pretty disconcerting for me. Coming to the realization that what I have been taught my entire life is definitely not the whole story has really walloped me. I have recovered somewhat from the initial “my whole world view is falling apart” scare to trying to slow down and work through this rationally and prayerfully and that has helped.
My fear is that as I learn more about the church and its imperfections that it is a hop skip and a jump to questioning Christianity itself and even God. I believe many people have been through this exact same scenario and was hoping for some direction on this journey. I feel like I definitely want and need God in my life in some form. How do you make your way through all your questions and doubts without completely losing faith?
My approach to this problem was simply to separate everything into independent parts rather than try to tie everything together as if they all depend on each other the way the LDS Church typically likes to do. For example, Christianity is not really the same thing as organized religion. To me organized religions all look like they are mostly man-made institutions that should not realistically be expected to be anywhere near perfect even though they are often worthwhile or valuable to people that find comfort in them. Once I started to look at things on an individual basis I found that some faith-based ideas were much easier for me to believe than others.
For example, general belief in God and an afterlife still makes a lot more sense to me than the specific claim that the Bible is supposed to be the authoritative and nearly literal word of God. Also, the more I thought about it the more I realized that I don’t really have a problem with anything Christ supposedly said or the claim that he was resurrected either. I also appreciate the courage Paul and other apostles had to risk their lives to spread the Christian faith to Rome, Athens, etc. and I don’t see any good reason that there couldn’t have been some divine intervention involved in the overall success of Christianity.
Sure it would be great if there were always trustworthy and reliable prophets around that could easily answer almost every question with direct input from God about what exactly we should do and believe but looking at all the evidence I can find I just don’t believe that God works that way anymore. Now I think too much faith in fallible men is generally a bad idea that will set people up for disappointment. Of course, some skeptics think there is no good reason to have any faith whatsoever in God or any hope for an afterlife either but I could never really believe these cynical ideas myself. As far as I’m concerned, as long as people can believe then faith, hope, and charity will generally make them happier and healthier in this life regardless of what happens when we die.
It takes quite some time to not feel “broken” once disaffection begins. It took me a little over a year. If I go back and look at the emotional stress I went through … The stages of grief are definitely there (Yes, the stages used to describe how a person reacts to a death). There are times when you will get angry but I believe it is a stage you should try hard to work through and eventually move away from.
I’ve come to realize that placing a blame is impossible. “The Church” .. is many factors, individuals, years, disagreements and IMO many mistakes, lies, prejudices etc. of men (and of course good stuff too). I wouldn’t compare you finding out “questionable” church history with finding out about past history of your spouse in a marriage..Only because, IMO you don’t owe the church your faith in this life even if you did make commitments to it…and the church doesn’t (and won’t) owe you an explanation or apology for your hurt … BUT you do owe respect to current members, iow don’t try and sway them or belittle them including family and friends. You owe it to yourself to find truth both in the church or outside of the church and to come out of the experience without bitterness and in a healthy state of mind. You won’t feel broken forever and hopefully you will feel confident and comfortable with your changing beliefs eventually.
I am so glad I found this site. I would guess there are others in my ward that may be having the same experience I am having and it would be nice to talk with them but guessing or finding out who those people are seems impossible. I appreciate so much that I can ask questions and get some great insights and advice from people who have gone through this themselves. I am uncertain and apprehensive about where this journey might lead me. Right now I am pretty grumpy and confused about the church and religion in general but I am hopeful that I can develop a faith and belief system that is actually mine. In a way I feel like the blinders have been taken off and I have this whole wide area to explore but it is really scary because I have had the blinders on my whole life. However, the great insight and advice on this site kind of acts like road signs so I do not feel completely rudderless on how I should proceed. Thanks again for all the great input.
trudge52 wrote:In a way I feel like the blinders have been taken off and I have this whole wide area to explore …
Precisely how I feel, sometimes. I am astonished at how often others here, such as yourself, express thoughts that I naively used to think were mine alone. It’s great not to be entirely alone.I often wonder if there are like-minded people in my ward. How would they recognize me, I wonder.
If you are worried about questioning the church further and then eventually Christianity as a whole I suggest you slam on the brakes and throw the care in reverse. More study of actual history both mormon and of the world is most likely to lead to one conclusion if you are not biased. doug wrote:
I often wonder if there are like-minded people in my ward. How would they recognize me, I wonder.Psst… over here in Aisle 7, just near the door.
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