- This topic is empty.
-
Posts
-
Brian Johnston wrote:
I understand them not wanting us to sew doubts …
This raises the issue of some really interesting cross-stiching I could do. Just thought I’d share that.
Welcome Rumpole! I don’t have much time so I’m going to end up sharing a few scattered thoughts. These are some of the things that have helped me adapt. I can relate to much of what you share. It’s funny, I used to think of myself as more religious than spiritual, but today I feel that my thoughts and heart are much more authentically spiritual than institutionally religious. I may have a slightly different view of what “spiritual” is than I used to, but that is a different topic. (I don’t necessarily have a strong correlation between emotional or sentimental and spiritual.) I have come to understand the Mormon definition of “doubting” for most purposes as the absense of faith. In the Mormon way “doubt” is such a nasty topic because it is taken to mean “I will NOT believe unless you can prove that I need to.” I think “questioning” is the term to use, along with “I don’t have a perfect understanding.” These things are much more broadly supported. We are supposed to question and search because it is precisely those things that initiate the process of revelation. We know that in our human state we obtain “a perfect understanding” on so precious few things that the lack of one is more than forgivable. When I hear people express “serious doubts” I can’t help but note to myself how much better it would sound if they said “serious questions” or even that they are “deeply troubled” about some information that they have not been able to reconcile.
I can relate to the desire to validate the “one and only” authentic authority from God aspect of holding to the “truth” claims of the church. This was also the most difficult aspect of my personal struggle. All I can really say is it takes MUCH time in reflection to begin to sort things out for yourself. If you have a desire to make staying in the church work for yourself, I would suggest you make this struggle a priority for yourself to endure. For me personally I came to realize that an exit from the church was not an option, just as ripping my family and marriage apart was not an option. Today I’m glad that it wasn’t, it has been a tremendous learning opportunity for me and today I enjoy my time in church again – even though I recognize I may interpret MANY things in significantly different ways than the general membership. The key is to become comfortable with your direct relationship with God, and don’t let anyone or anything step in the middle. For example in a TR interview I see the one asking the questions as facilitating for God as I have come to understand Him. If the question doesn’t exactly fit what God would actually ask, I realize the difference is due to “seeing darkly” or a mis-translation as is so common in our human state. I answer the questions in the way God would have me answer, and isn’t that really the point?! I am much more comfortable with God than I am with the church, but at the same time God has let me know my community and the place He wants me to publicly worship is in the church – so I go with it.
As far as the “one and only” goes, all I know for sure is it is MY “one and only” choice. I don’t claim the ability to receive revelation for others, and in my view if I felt I could claim that THEY needed to join our church to secure their salvation, then that would effectively be the same as receiving personal revelation for them. My thoughts are not God’s thoughts. How could I possibly understand the meaning and purpose of every other life? How could I possibly interpret God’s purpose as requiring ALL mankind to be baptized into our church?! I need to do what I feel is right for ME. And let my brother “worship how where or what he may.” In other words I cannot comprehend universal truths in the spiritual realm. Spirituality is personal, that is the way it has been revealed to me, that is the only way I can understand it.
Good luck on your journey, I hope to hear more from you!
What a great post, Orson. Thank you. Welcome Rumpole.
I will quote Mitch Albom from his book, Have a Little Faith
Quote:I know what I believe. It’s in my soul. But what I constantly to tell our people, you should be convinced of the authenticity of what you have, but you must be humble enough to say that we don’t know everything. And Since we don’t know everything, we must accept that someone else may believe something else.
Because others in my family and my ward believe things different than me, I accept that because I accept we don’t know everything.
I don’t think this is a comforting thought, but I do believe it is true…that sometimes we get to a point we start to journey very much on our own, and that can be hard. The doubts you have are valid, but it is hard to share them with your spouse or family sometimes, depending on where they are.
But you are not alone, and we are glad you are here. Welcome to the forum.
Rumpole, As far as feeling guilty for not being a spiritual person I recommend you check out MTBI – Myers/Brigg personality information – tests and information are available all over the internet for free. It models personality types into 16 different categories. One significant aspect of this is your personality type largely impacts how “spiritual’ you are. For my personality type deep spiritual feelings are very common and normal. However, for many personality types that is not the case. It would seem odd to feel guilty about being the personality type you are. It’s just who you are and it doesn’t mean something is wrong with you. It certainly wouldn’t be a “sin” to be the personality type you are which is who God made you to be.
For me personally it was a very difficult decision to be direct with my wife on my lack of belief. After the decision was made it was also very difficult to work through the impact on both of us. However, perhaps ironically, it has had resulting in some significant improvements in our marriage – before “coming out” in our 17 years of marriage I had often felt more as a role to my wife than a person. It seemed much of her assessment of me was based on how Peter Priesthood I was – of course not believing or struggling with my belief made it difficult for me to be motivated to try to act Peter Priesthood enough for her liking and there was always a tension there – for example, she would often nag me to bear my testimony in sacrament meeting – which would’ve required me to lie or to say some really inappropriate things for sacrament meeting. She has now essentially been forced to come to terms with the fact that she is married to me as me. In our case she has largely let the role script go and I feel more accepted by her as the person I am than ever before. It was not a painless process.
I am also much more comfortable being out in the open with my beliefs in many ways personally. I am also happy to not being doing the frustrating and confusing back and forth trying to figure out what I believed and trying to do mental gymnastics trying to force myself to believe something that in my mind just didn’t add up.
I’m glad things have worked well with your bishop. I think it is often the case that bishops are just fine with you struggling with your faith. In essence, that’s the whole point of faith and the first principle of the gospel. It would be incongruous to child someone for using faith when they are not sure. If you are still trying to believe and not sure if you believe but living the gospel they may consider that close enough – which is what it sounds like your bishop has done. I had two bishops that took that approach. However, once I was pretty definite that I didn’t believe – I specifically stated that I no longer had faith but I could be faithful – the third bishop took a pretty hard line (which may have had more to do with his personality than anything.)
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.