I MAKE THE WORST APOSTATE

Tonight I went out with my friends. I went to a strip club, had a few drinks. Okay, I had more than a few drinks. It was really the shots of vodka that got me ... relaxed. I went out with money in my wallet but I think I left most of it in the thong of a topless woman. 


I drove home drunk. I stumbled into the door when my wife opened it for me after pounding on it incessantly. I then threw up on the carpet. My wife started cleaning up my vomit and so I kicked her in the butt and made her fall over. I laughed as I stumbled down the hall to my bed where I passed out.

Actually, none of that's true. I didn't go out with friends and I most certainly didn't go to a strip club. I didn't drink, I didn't bang on the door or even throw up. I didn't hit my wife or pass out on the bed.

Can I tell you what I really did?

I started the evening off with my youngest child, who was tired and ready for bed. I took my youngest into his room, put his pajamas on, rocked him till his eyes struggled to stay open, then gently placed him in his crib, all the while singing 'Amazing Grace.'

After wishing my youngest a peaceful night's sleep, I spent the early part of the evening with my three oldest children at the high school soccer field. We ran back and forth on the field, kicking the ball in the net and watching each other do cartwheels. We cheered for each other when we scored a goal or made a descent cartwheel. Even I joined in the fun, showing off my amazing cartwheeling talent (Ha!). There happened to be a baseball game in progress next door to the soccer fields. So after our intense soccer match and some competitive cartwheeling, I bought the kids slushies from the concession stand and we watched a little bit of America's past time.

When we got back from the soccer field the kids put on their pajamas and went to bed while I took a shower, changed my clothes and headed out to the bookstore. I took with me my history books, a note pad and a pen. For roughly two hours I read in the coffee shop at the bookstore. I will admit, the aroma and ambiance of the coffee shop worked its magic on me and I couldn't resist buying myself a little sinful treat for the ride home ... yep, a frozen hot chocolate. It sounds like a contradiction, but it is so yummy.

On my ride home I thought about the upcoming weekend. I am manning a booth to promote a tobacco free lifestyle at a PFLAG conference on Saturday. It dawned on me though that the community kitchen that serves the homeless recently finished remodeling their kitchen. This means that my two oldest children and I can return to serving lunch on Saturdays. My mind began to work out a strategy to squeeze in just one hour away from the conference to take my kids to the newly remodeled kitchen and help serve lunch. It's going to be tough but my oldest won't stop talking about it. She will be so excited.

I'm home now. I'll go to bed soon. I may read a little bit more or just go to sleep. I've left my Bible open to Isaiah, so maybe I'll step in my study to continue reading about the suffering servant.

I always thought that a life away from the church would be a little bit more ... dangerous ... risky ... maybe even a little bit more evil. There were so many testimony meetings where I would hear people say things like, "If it wasn't for the church, I would be a horrible person." I'm just not finding that to be the case.

I guess I just stink at this apostate stuff. I tried coffee before and I don't like it. In April I went to New Orleans for a conference and tried a beer and sampled a few drinks. It's nasty and all alcohol is overrated on both sides of the aisle. I'm too poor for a strip club and I have no desire to go in one anyway. My wife is too amazing a person to ever hit, nor do I have a desire to hit another human being. I always imagined that apostates were mean, violent and behaved like the selfish criminals of the nightly news. Could I be wrong?

I guess I make the worst apostate.

Search Ponder Pray Repeat

FASCINATION TO EXCESS AND THE SONS OF PERDITION

The departure from Mormonism includes a roller coaster of emotions. Leaving is a long process of grief, anger, confusion and all the emotions in between. Just to make it even more exciting, one does not simply progress from one stage to the next as if in a set sequence. No, it truly is a mixture of painful sensations. There are points when you are so sure that it is time to walk away, but then, in a moment of doubt, you second guess yourself and keep trying to make it - the church, it's teachings, its history - work.  You throw in the towel on occasions to only then pick it up and try again. You try and make yourself live in the tension of your personal beliefs and recent insights to LDS history, and the teachings of the church, hoping that through endurance the dissonance will find resolution.

I remember so many times saying to myself, "I can make this work. It's not that bad, just don't think about it." The "it" being my personal disagreement with LDS theology, the white-washed history, and the feeling of being horribly alone. But, you try to endure and make it work. This period of trying to make it work is best described with an analogy. Imagine listening to two violins play the same piece of music at the same time. One of the violins is tuned just a hair flat and the other, a hair sharp. The dissonance never resolves. The entire tune is characterized by the tension between the two violins in disharmony. So goes the struggle to find a way to make it work when faced with the historical and theological conundrums of the LDS church. There is nothing more than constant dissonance. The human being was never meant to live in such tension. It brings depression and utter madness. We  are creatures of harmony, therefore the dissonance must resolve. Leaving, over time, brings harmony.

As time has created a sense of distance, I have now entered a new phase of my ex-mormonism/post-mormonism/apostate-ness. I am in this place of utter fascination with Mormonism. LDS history is absolutely amazing. The Journal of Discourse, for example, is jaw dropping. It is absolutely fascinating. It all just goes on and on: the alterations of the Temple ceremony, the second anointing, blood atonement, the Council of Fifty, the Anointed Quorum, etc. It's all just so fascinating. Even the Book of Mormon has come full circle in a way; it was once treasured scripture for me, then I loathed it, and now it is absolutely fascinating. I study it now with more focus and rigor than I did as an active member.

Do you notice that I use the word 'fascinating' to excess? Yeah, its the word that just falls out of my mouth as I read church history. It's that word always ready to leave my lips as I learn something new they didn't tell me in Sunday School.

Please note, the more I read and learn about Mormonism the more at peace I am with moving on. I have an immense sensation of calmness in knowing I don't have to ignore or defend those parts of LDS history intentionally left out of church manuals. Instead, it's there waiting for exploration. I'm not associated with the icky parts of LDS history. The history is no longer automatically 'anti,' and therefore discarded. Instead, it's nothing more than history without a personal ideology to create a predisposition to throw it away when it makes me feel uncomfortable.  I don't have to defend it or claim it as my own. There is a healthy space now between me with my personal beliefs, and the history and contemporary practices of the LDS church. I can look on in curiosity.

For example, when I first learned that Joseph Smith repeatedly committed polyandry, I was flabbergasted, hurt, and enraged. The man I loved and called my prophet did what? I would have called it anti-Mormon lies, but then it turns out to be true. When learning this I was so entirely crushed. It was at a time when I was searching Mormonism with such intentionality for something to hold on to and something that would help me stay in. As you can imagine (and evidenced by a previous post) it didn't work out that way.

Now, I am hungry to learn more. I am no longer filled with a sense of disgust and betrayal. I am now reading with eyes wide open and find it all so wonderfully ... fascinating. I will admit that there are moments of frustration. There are moments when I sit in disbelief that the institution claiming such a God-inspired history/theology doesn't feel comfortable sharing all of that history/theology with its members. Then I remind myself that it's no longer my institution, I smile, and I keep reading. I return to a place of harmony within myself where there is space between me, my identity and the LDS church.

It turns out, I'm not the only one who has struggled with their Mormon heritage.

I recently discovered an awe-inspiring group of people that struggle with finding harmony as they emerge from  the confines of a different bread of Mormonism. Jennilyn Merten and Tyler Measom recently released The Sons Of Perdition. This documentary follows the journey of a few young men who have either left the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints or who were kicked out. I've decided that I want to bring this documentary to Oklahoma for a viewing, so I'll post again when I can make that happen. I figure, I can't be the only one fascinated.

www.sonsofperditionthemovie.com

I would highly recommend listening to the interview of Merten and Measom concerning the documentary. Their insight on the struggles these boys face as they leave Mormonism draws the listener into a foreign world that sits right on the boarder of Arizona and Utah. It gives some perspective on the struggle of leaving the Fundamentalist LDS faith. It also makes me excited to see the film and yet brings me to tears to hear of these boys' struggles to find identity, meaning and place.

Interview of Merten and Measom

Here's another book for the wish list: Bhattacharya's Secrets and Wives: The Hidden World of Mormon Polygamy. In addition, Bhattacharya produced a documentary in 2006 focused on the hunt for Warren Jeff, the leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

Bhattacharya's Documentary: The Man with 80 Wives

Interview of Bhattacharya

Search Ponder Pray Repeat