Update: If you don't want any Brainwashed and Anointed spoilers then don't read this blog post. I wrote it before the book was written so it's pretty much a nutshell version of my story.
My parents converted to The Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints when I was two years old, so Mormon doctrine seemed as
natural to me as all the other life lessons I would learn growing up. Learning
about the prophet Joseph Smith and The Book of Mormon was just as normal for me
as learning about gravity. What goes up must come down, and that is exactly
what happened to my faith.
Before I begin, I should tell you that I have now
officially left the LDS church by having my name removed from its records.
Prior to this I had been inactive for about six years, although during that
time I was still battling with my feelings about the Church. For twenty-seven
years of my life I was an active member. I went through primary, the youth
system, the young adult system, I graduated from Seminary, I held numerous
callings, I served as a missionary, and I was married in the temple, so I know
the religion inside and out. In fact I know it so well that this honest account
of my personal experience with the Church will not be classed as free speech,
but as anti-Mormon literature. I will be classed as apostate and making my
reservations for a hot retreat in the afterlife. Touchy right? Back then I
would not have dreamed in a million years that I would be someone criticising
Mormonism, yet here I am. The reason I am doing this is because I have been
holding on to a lot of anger and this is my way of getting that out of my
system so that I can finally have closure and move on. I thought about just
hammering all this out on my keyboard and not letting anyone else see it. After
all, I do not want to cause offence to members of the Church, some of whom are
still my friends. I’m not trying to lead anyone else astray either, but the
fact is the Church and its indoctrination impacted my life in a negative way,
and so I make no apologies for illustrating just how it did that. Maybe others
have had similar experiences, or maybe this will help someone else already battling
with the process of unravelling its heavy chains. I want my parents to know
that I don’t blame them at all for raising me in the Church. Fortunately for
me, they were not militant or overly strict religious parents, but they
believed they were doing the right thing after being indoctrinated themselves.
I suppose the buck stops at the organisation itself, not those who fell under
its powerful delusion.
Growing up as a Mormon can be extremely difficult
for children leaving the safety of home life and church circles when starting
school. I was lucky because I seemed to blend in well enough and although my
friends knew I went to church for three hours every Sunday, I don’t think I
came across as too peculiar. When I started secondary school I stood out a
little more because people caught on that I didn’t drink tea, coffee or
alcohol. They knew it was for religious reasons and I was lucky that it didn’t
really cause me many awkward situations. My close school friends didn’t really
drink either, so it was quite easy to not feel abnormal. My brother wasn’t as
fortunate. He really took on-board being told as a primary child to tell all his
school friends his beliefs and invite them to church on Sunday, as if such
missionary efforts would then convert his infant friends, then their parents,
and then a whole new family would be members of the Church! As expected none of
them came to Church, instead my brother became a target and was bullied until
he was finally forced to leave school. I suppose my point here is to highlight
how early children are taught to be missionary minded. If you were to attend a
testimony meeting you will most likely see little kids standing at the pulpit
saying, “I know the Church is true. I know Joseph Smith was a prophet, I know
Jesus died for me”. The same kids who believe in Santa Claus and the tooth
fairy. It may seem harmless to members, but is this not early
brainwashing? The Church even teaches
that if you want to gain a testimony, you should bear it. Isn’t that a nice
little affirmation to help re-wire your mind?
It’s difficult to really say when I gained my own
personal testimony of what I thought back then was the truthfulness of the
Church. My teenage life was pretty busy with church routine. Most mornings
before school I would get up really early to attend a seminary class, which is
basically a scripture study group. We were also encouraged to have a personal
scripture study session every morning too, so I was pretty drained before I
even got to school. Monday evening we had Family Home Evening, which for those
of you that aren’t aware is a time for family prayer, scripture study, followed
by a fun activity. Tuesday evening was a youth activity night, and on Sunday,
three hours of church, and sometimes an evening fireside or devotional. If you
aren’t a Church member all that sounds pretty intense, and it was, but there
are positives I can draw from it too. We did grow very close as a family during
Home Evenings, and I was able to do some fun and interesting activities during
youth activity nights. It was also a good chance to see my best friends, who to
this day remain my best friends. (They are all ‘inactive’ now). There were
additional responsibilities too, such as the various meetings we needed to
attend depending on what church calling we had. Home Teaching was another duty,
where once a month we would visit families assigned to us and share a spiritual
message and attend to any needs they might have. I bonded with some of these
families and it was nice being able to serve them when they needed some help,
so I’m not criticising this particular practice, I’m just pointing out how
immersed my life was in church culture. Again, I was raised in the church, so
the lifestyle was natural for me; it wasn’t until I reached the age of fourteen
or fifteen that I began to have struggles with it.
I’m going to use sex words in this next part, so if
you’re easily offended then maybe go and put the kettle on and have a hot
chocolate if you’re a Mormon or a coffee if you’re not, and come back for the
next part while I continue my rambling. Or don’t. Use your free agency.
Being a teenager in the Church, well, it’s hard. (No
pun intended). Before I go down this road I want to preface it with how I viewed
myself at this time: I was a priesthood holder of The Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints, the only true church, it boldly claims, on the
face of the whole earth. I was a valiant spirit in the pre-earth life because I
had been born (well I was two, but let’s not ruin this mantra) into a Mormon
family. If I believed what the Church leaders were saying at the time, and I
did, I truly was one of the elect. I was privately self-important and arrogant
like the rest of my peers, thinking I was one of the chosen ones. Not even the
Queen could bless the sacrament on a Sunday or call angels down to minister,
but I could. My poor non-valiant non-member friends, don’t worry I’ll pray for
you and try and save your souls with conversion.
Seriously though, at age fifteen I felt a massive
weight on my young shoulders. Things were getting more intense for me now. I
really believed I had to stay clean, pure and worthy, so that I could start
preparing to serve a two year mission when I reached the age of nineteen. I
wanted to reach the highest degree of Heaven, Exaltation in the Celestial
Kingdom, where it is promised that I can be with my family for time and all
eternity. Let’s not forget that if I wanted to be blessed with an eternal
companion, I had better stay pure, clean and worthy, words I would hear time
and time again in my lessons as a young man. I had to learn obedience. I had to
always have the spirit with me and not offend the Holy Ghost or I’d be
unworthy, unclean, and shameful. My vice, (which is now my pleasure) back then
was music. I loved rap, punk and heavy metal, but the lyrics were not ‘conducive
to the spirit’ so I would throw them out in the trash. I would watch a film and
if it had swearing or sex in I’d either stop watching or if I did stick with it
I’d spend the night praying for forgiveness and asking that the spirit would
return to me. It was promised that the Holy Ghost would be my constant
companion unless I caused offence. Come back to me, I’m sorry. I know I
shouldn’t have watched that or listened to that. I’ll throw it out to prove how
sorry I am. Even if I swore I’d feel guilty! Then there are the sins of
omission. If I didn’t read my scriptures for ten minutes that day, I’d start
feeling like I’m drifting out of the light. There are so many things I could
list but what I want to concentrate on now was the real burden that hung around
my neck like a milestone – being a teenage boy with sexual urges.
I’ve had many discussions with my church raised friends
over the years about how horrible the guilt was for us all when we ‘slipped
up’. At school I was taught that masturbation was a natural act. At home, well
who the hell wants to talk to their parents about that? I didn’t and I wouldn’t have if they had
tried, so that left Church for me, which after all was the most important stance
anyway, because... Heaven.
I was never taught that it was a sin by any of my
local leaders, until it was too late. Church books educated me that it was
sinful and shameful, and it was confirmed for me during a confession session
with a Bishop. I don’t know if the Church has updated its information on it,
and quite frankly I don’t care if they have because it didn’t help us back then
when it was classed as a carnal sin that needed repenting of. My friends and I
spent years feeling guilty because we all had to stay clean enough so that we
could pass or bless the sacrament on a Sunday. One Bishop told us to imagine
the nails being smashed into Christ’s hands as a pleasant little aid to help us
concentrate on staying worthy. One book,
backed up by scripture, informed me that when we masturbate, demons watch, laugh
and mock us for it. So you spend however long you can resisting the urge, which
in itself makes you the most frustrated stressed out ‘stop tempting me Satan!’
individual in town, then you give in because it’s near impossible, to be left
feeling like the hosts of hell are surrounding you. It’s creepy and plays
tricks with your mind, so I would spend the rest of the night reading scripture
and praying desperately for forgiveness. I would ask that the spirit return,
that the demons would be cast out, I would feel sick and beg for mercy and
forgiveness, promising to change, promising to see the Bishop about it. Let me
tell you, it’s quite degrading to sit opposite a Bishop and tell him you’ve
been beating yours. To be fair to my Bishops, they didn’t really seem to want
to know or care, and kind of just shooed me along. They knew it was inevitable.
They could relate.
No sex before marriage. That was set in stone. I
knew that. The other stuff was a grey area for me and my friends. Again, it
wasn’t until it was too late that we were told, ‘Uh oh! That’s all serious sin
too. Phone the Bishop’. We all tried our
best growing up, but sometimes we fell short of what the Church demanded.
However I guarantee you that we paid the price for it and then some. The guilt
caused genuine suffering. We couldn’t even admit it to each other. It was
embarrassing and humiliating to sit across from a Bishop and explain what you
had done. It was heart wrenching to feel like you had disappointed God, caused
Christ to suffer in Gethsemane, and lost the companionship of the Holy Ghost.
You felt abandoned, alone, unclean, immoral and wretched. You felt unworthy to
carry out Church duties. If you were asked to give a talk in church, teach a
lesson, or assist in giving a blessing, you felt panic, because you need the
spirit for those things. I think life for any teenager is challenging enough
without the tremendous amount of unnecessary guilt and shame heaped on them for
what I now believe to be normal and natural experiences. The Church teaches
that through repentance you find forgiveness, so at times I did feel forgiven,
but the constant cycle of sin- repent- confesses-forgiven, was emotionally
exhausting. I wish I could have just been permitted to explore and experience
natural behaviours like most people do and not punish myself for them.
When I was eighteen I was given the Melchizedek
priesthood, which added more responsibility.
At the time I felt it was a great honour and a privilege, despite being
told that I’d be held accountable in the next life if I didn’t receive it, and
that ‘... whoso breaketh this covenant after he hath received it, and
altogether turneth therefrom, shall not have forgiveness of sins in this world
nor in the world to come’. (Doctrine and Covenants 84:81) Damned if I do,
damned if I don’t. Damn it! I’m officially damned.
I spent this whole
year being as righteous and proactive as I possibly could. I was preparing for
a two year mission as an Elder of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints. I broke up with my girlfriend at the time and I started attending seminary
classes even though I had already graduated. I would even knock doors in town
with a friend to preach the gospel. I gave a presentation at college about the
Church and my mission. I gave all my friends copies of The Book of Mormon. I
visited families, gave tons of talks at Church, taught lessons, and spent most
of my time listening to Church talk tapes and reading Mormon literature. I did
my damned best to stay as worthy and as pure as I possibly could. I threw out
more CDs and stopped watching anything deemed inappropriate by the Church. I
even cut out television completely for awhile to really focus on my scripture
study and meditation. As well as studying at college I was also working retail
jobs to contribute money towards my mission. I’m not meaning to sound arrogant here, but I
really felt like I could not have been any more prepared for my mission. I was
well versed in Mormon doctrine, I knew the scriptures well, and I was confident
in my ability of bringing souls to Christ.
I was nineteen years
old when my mission call arrived in the post. I was called to serve in
Roseville, California for two years. I spent Christmas with my family and then
the following month I was off.
My Bishop at the
time was a lovely, kind-hearted and wise man, whom had really helped me prepare
for my new adventure. To this day I will not speak a bad word about him because
he really is one of the best people I’ve had the pleasure of knowing, despite
our now opposing beliefs. There are wonderful and sincere people in the Church
and my Bishop was one of the best examples. Another man I really valued was my
Stake President, a warm and gentle man. He set me apart as a missionary, and
the next thing I knew I was on a plane to America. It was horrendous saying
goodbye to my family. We were all upset at the airport and it felt gloomy. My
only contact to them for two years would be by letter, which I was allowed to
write once a week. This was the first time I had been on an aeroplane.
My first stop was
Provo, Utah, where I would attend the Missionary Training Centre for three
weeks before going out to California. I expected a spiritual feast at the MTC,
but I was left starving. I was assigned an MTC companion and given an ugly,
bland, basic room, which we shared with two other missionaries. They were all
from Utah, the Mormon capital. They were nice enough guys, but I soon learnt my
companion was having masturbation problems and needing to see the MTC president.
I felt fed up. No one seemed like they wanted to be there. I genuinely wanted
to serve and teach people the gospel, but they felt like they had to be there
for their families. One guy even said that girls wouldn’t date him unless he
went on a mission. This is another bugbear for me. We were taught that it was a
commandment to serve a mission, and the young women are taught that they
deserve nothing less than a returned missionary for a husband. Don’t you worry
about who people really are, or who you fall in love with, just make sure they
tick all the Mormon boxes.
I assumed everyone
would be buzzing in the MTC, but I found the atmosphere depressing. The only
time my roommates seemed happy was when playing pranks on each other. We would
get up at the crack of dawn, go and share a shower with a bunch of other
strange naked dudes, and come back to our room for scripture study. The whole
day would be filled with classes hammering home the need for obedience. I was
used to teaching people from the heart and the scriptures, but now we had to
learn scripts and sales techniques. I saw some people in tears because they
were struggling with it and others half asleep. It felt so forced being told to
share our testimonies with each other in the cold light of day. The class was
just full of the same old phrases and mantras, nothing was heartfelt or
sincere. I can’t recall much else about the classes anymore. All I remember is
the word ‘obedience!’
I liked everyone in
my class, but there was blatant ignorance among some of them. I think it was
during our second week in the MTC that a few of them were questioning why they
weren’t feeling the spirit. One of them chirped up with, ‘Well, my parents told
me that because we live in Utah we are so used to feeling the spirit that we
are immune to it now’. They all nodded in agreement, feeling pleased with that.
My one saving grace
in the MTC was a Canadian missionary in my class. (He has also left the church
now). We instantly bonded and had a lot in common. He too was feeling the Utah
culture shock. The Church wasn’t really like this back home was it?
One day of the week
we were allowed to wear casual clothes, catch up on laundry and exercise. I
remember putting on a Greenday hoodie that my brother had given me as a leaving
gift. Nothing was on it apart from the band and its name. I was off to play
basketball but was stopped. ‘Elder Yeoman, that isn’t appropriate for a
missionary to be wearing’. Sorry mate, but they don’t have BYU hoodies back in
England. On my suit I wore a small pin badge which had the Union Jack and the
American flag on. I was stopped in a hallway by an MTC leader and told to
remove it because it ‘detracts from the message’. Maybe this all sounds petty
to you, but it was these little things that really started to grind on me,
stripping away any personal identity I had, and making me a Utah robot.
I felt nothing
spiritual in the MTC or the Provo Temple sessions. I felt homesick and deflated.
My letters home just read like brainwashed affirmations.
After three weeks
of robot school, I travelled to Roseville California where I met my new mission
companion, another young lad from Utah. We lived above a garage on a member’s
property. It was a nice enough room and my companion was a decent type.
I think I was a
couple of weeks into the mission when I suffered my first panic attack. I
remember being in the shower finding it hard to catch my breath, and I started
freaking out. My heart was pounding and adrenaline coursed through my veins. I
felt so much dread and fear, I just wanted to run. I know now this was the
fight or flight scenario, but I didn’t know what a panic attack was at the
time. I assumed Satan was attacking me, trying to stop me from serving the
Lord, so I kept repressing it and hiding it away. I’d go to bed begging God to
rescue me from what was happening. A God of miracles could surely stop this
happening to me, right? The panic attacks kept coming. What is happening? I’m
an ordained missionary, so why does the phone line to Heaven seem off the hook?
I had never felt so isolated. I was so far
away from home and my family. The letters arrived so late due to airmail that
we were never up to speed with each other. Even God had apparently abandoned
me, so try as I might to fight; the only logical solution for me was flight. I
was a pale, shaken up, nervous wreck, which meant I was a burden to my
companion and ineffective in the mission field. I talked to my companion and
then my mission president about what was happening and that’s when the first
piece of advice came in. Spend the day getting a nice milkshake at a local
diner. Wow, this must be some milkshake! I wonder if they prescribe it on the
NHS?
Meanwhile my parents were being told to not write to me, nor take my phone
calls. Anyway, my mission president was right- a nice break from riding my bike
all day and knocking doors, did allow me a moment to gather my thoughts
together. My companion was a great guy too, and I agreed not to be hasty and
give the missionary work another try. I was still getting doors slammed in my
face, still teaching people about the Church, and trying my best, but the panic
attacks would not relent. I was physically and emotionally exhausted. I
couldn’t even sit in a Church meeting on a Sunday without walking out feeling
despair. Try as I might, I just couldn’t get my thoughts together. I was sick
of shaking, I was sick of feeling dread, and I was sick of pleading to God for
help. All I wanted to do was escape.
I wanted to call
home, but I needed permission because it was against mission rules. Then I had
to find out the country code and after some frustrating attempts, I eventually
got through to my dad and told him what was happening. He knew what panic
attacks were because he suffered, and still does suffer with them. At least now
I had a name for what was happening to me. It wasn’t the Devil after all? I
told my mission president that it wasn’t the Adversary or homesickness, it was
panic attacks, and I needed help.
I was so stressed
out during this period of time that I can’t remember the order of events. It’s
just one big anxiety ridden blur to me even now. What I do know though is that
I again told my dad, companion, and mission president that I wanted to stay and
try and serve. I did try again and then quickly failed. Another batch of
attacks had finished me off and all I knew was that I was done and I wanted to
go home. During this time I was sat down by a local Bishop and the ward mission
leader after they heard that I was leaving the mission field. The conversation
is a blur to me, but I remember it feeling like an interrogation where two
grown men, who ought to know better, told an ill nineteen year old boy that he
had best hope that his plane doesn’t go down on the way home in case he ends up
in hell. Don’t worry though, my awesome stake president from England would
phone me later and boost me up. Actually scrap that. He told me that if I came
home I would be ‘letting my family down, my ward down, and my stake down’. It
was heartbreaking to hear that from a man I had respected and looked up to as a
spiritual leader. If only I knew then what I know now, that he was cheating on
his wife at the time and abusing his calling as stake president, maybe then I
wouldn’t have cared what his opinion was. I vaguely remember talking to my home
ward Bishop who was one of the few people that showed me any
understanding.
I spent my last day
with a bunch of missionaries who were silently judging me for leaving. So long,
Roseville! I really appreciate your well
wishes and compassion.
I got a flight to
San Francisco on my own and then flew to Utah where I would meet my dad at the
airport. We would be staying with the missionary who baptised my parents and
his family while I would get some ‘care’. At this point I had to play along
with the notion that I wasn’t going home to England, I was just going back to
Utah to get treatment and then return to the mission field. They assumed a
little time with my dad would do the trick.
In Utah I got off
the plane and had to walk through a bunch of Mormon families greeting their
returned missionaries with banners and welcome home signs. What a happy affair!
I don’t think I have ever felt so embarrassed and ashamed in all my life as I
walked through that crowd and over to my worried looking dad. He said I looked
deathly white and frail, while I wished the ground would just open up and
swallow me whole.
I don’t even know
how long we stayed in Utah for. It felt like a year, but was probably a few months.
My dad was getting pressure to convince me to return to Roseville, while I was
seeing a local church councillor for my panic attacks. By then the Holy Ghost
was like a long lost friend. Anxiety was now my constant companion. I felt
highly strung, always on the verge of a breakdown, and depression set in. I was
so desperate to just go home that I stopped caring who I was letting down. I
knew I was definitely finished with being a missionary because someone asked me
if I’d go back to Roseville if an angel appeared to me and commanded me to. I
replied that I felt so sick that I would have to say no.
The Church couldn’t
bear the thought of me just resting in a house during the day, so it decided to
tell me to go and work in a Church canning factory. My dad out rightly refused.
‘Do you know who you’re talking to? I’m a relative of the prophet Wilford
Woodruff!’ said the voice on the phone. ‘I don’t care if you’re the Pope!’ Dad
retorted, and hung up on him.
I was put on
medication and had a few sessions with a church psychologist, neither of which
helped me. I ended up on a drug that made me feel numb and disconnected. I
later learned this drug was heavily linked to suicides. When I first arrived in
the States I was given a cocktail of different injections which I apparently
needed. Some people think this may have caused a chemical imbalance in me which
resulted in panic attacks. I haven’t really looked into it enough to draw a
conclusion. The fact is I was having them then and I still am sixteen years
later.
Sometime during the
anxiety blur I stormed out of the house we were staying at after an argument,
probably with someone who was trying to get me to go back out to California. One
of the daughters of the family we were staying with followed me out, calmed me
down, took my hand and walked me back. This innocent little act was spotted by
a nosey Mormon neighbour and reported to the Church.
The Church’s final
attempt to get me to change my mind about leaving was by setting up a meeting
with a General Authority, whom they discovered I admired and looked up to. I
went to his office in Salt Lake City where he interviewed me.
This particular
Church leader was a real inspiration to me. Before my mission I had read
several of his books and listened to many of his talks, so I was quite pleased
to have the opportunity to meet him, despite my desperate to flee state of
mind.
I had hoped to be
uplifted, or at least understood, but I found myself in a confessional
situation. First of all I was chastised for holding a girl’s hand. After that he
didn’t accept a medical reason for my problem, but treated it as a spiritual
issue. I was asked if I had any unresolved sins that I needed to repent of. I
told him that I hadn’t, but that wasn’t good enough. He continued to probe, so
I had to mention that I had sinned in the past but that I had repented of them
correctly with my Bishop back home. Apparently that answer wasn’t adequate because
he asked me what those sins were. It’s a bit embarrassing having to confess
your sexual experiences to someone you had put on a pedestal. I wanted him to
think highly of me, but instead I was going over what the Church would call my
sinful acts. This was totally irrelevant and I’m still wondering why I needed
to repeat them after saying that I had sorted all that out long before my
mission. Well, he must have drawn a blank to why I wasn’t coping on a mission
because I was then asked if I was homosexual. The meeting left me cold. He gave
me a blessing before I left his office but it was as insightful as a brick. The
only thing I did agree with him on was that I needed to go home. I never could
pick up one of his books again.
Maybe you’re
wondering why my dad and I didn’t just leave and fly home ourselves? The reason
for that is the Church was holding on to my passport and for awhile we couldn’t
get it back. I believe they wanted me to return to California and it wasn’t
until my dad threatened that he would go to the press about it that they
reluctantly handed it over.
Before we returned
to the UK, the missionary that baptised my parents kindly tried to cheer us up
by taking us to some amazing places. I was really grateful for that and I feel
sorry that I wasn’t in a state of mind to really enjoy them. We left the
snow-capped mountains of Utah and visited the Hoover Dam, Arizona, the Grand
Canyon, and stayed a couple of nights in Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas. Incredible
places, but I just wanted to be home.
It was immensely
frustrating trying to convince the Church that I wasn’t going to be a missionary
anymore. In my mind I was done. I wasn’t sleeping and I was close to breaking
point. My Dad and a member of the local stake presidency supported my decision
to leave. With the latter’s aid it was finally set up for us to leave.
I remember the
relief I felt as the plane left the tarmac and I was finally in the air above
Utah. I sobbed like a child.
Are you all playing
your violins for me? I know this may come across really pathetic in the grand
scheme of things, but it’s all relative. This was a big deal for me. The
spiritual stress took its toll. I’d been at the heart of my religion and it was
nothing like I had imagined or been led to believe. All the leaders I spoke to
kept saying, ‘Don’t you go inactive now. Go home and get better and come back’.
I tried going back to my local ward when I was back in England, but it was too
hard. Rumours about my return started to circulate. I heard one person say that
I was just homesick, that my family was too close and it was unhealthy. Someone
else decided that I had probably had a relationship with one of the daughters
that we were staying with and so I was sent home dishonourably. The fact is I
received an honourable release from the Church, but I couldn’t attend it
anymore.
I started seeing a
non-Church psychologist and I was still taking the drugs which caused me more
harm than good. He confirmed that I had
indeed had a breakdown. I was numb and I knew I wasn’t myself anymore. I left
the Church but I still believed in all of its teachings. I found it hard to fit
in to normal life again but when I did start socialising and going out with
friends I met someone who I had a nine month relationship with. When time had
passed and we broke up I started to come back out to Church, but a new Bishop
had been called by then and I found myself put on Church disciplinary
probation. I was on it for far too long, and treated unfairly considering what
I had been put through. It took the Stake President to finally release me from
it. He even told me I had been on it for too long and enough was enough. The
Bishop said the spirit had told him to take me off it, which I knew wasn’t
quite true. One Sunday I was outside of church rather than in a lesson with a
few of my friends, just talking. A sister of one of my closest friends was
talking with us. She was a lot younger than us and someone I had babysat many
times over the years because our families were close friends. The Bishop pulled
me in and angrily suggested that I was being inappropriate considering I was on
probation. He made out like I was on a sex offenders list and I couldn’t be
trusted. What an ugly assumption and a horrendous insult.
The Church never
felt the same for me ever again, but after some time I got myself into a
position where I was doing all it was asking and trying to ease back into its
spirituality. As time passed, I baptised my new girlfriend into the Church and we
were later married in the London Temple.
Members argue that
the Church is perfect, but its people aren’t. Some have suggested to me that it
was imperfect people handling things badly that caused me more stress, but even
if that were the case I find it disturbing that people are allowed to be put
into influential positions which can cause a lot of damage. People are given
life advice, marriage advice and counsel by leaders that aren’t trained or
qualified to do so. It is widely believed that when someone is called to an
office it comes direct from God and so when they speak you should take it as
sound advice from the spirit. They are taught not to question or criticise its
leaders. They are basically told to obey and not to question. How dangerous is
that? I knew all this was nonsense but my testimony in the Church allowed me to
shrug it off. The indoctrination was so ingrained in me that despite my mission
experience I still wouldn’t speak out against its leaders.
My faith was
smashed to pieces when my wife miscarried. Since I was eighteen years old I had
been giving members priesthood blessings. The Church teaches that if you are
worthy and spiritually in tune then you can bless people through the guidance
of the spirit. I always felt good doing it, but then that’s because I’m placing
positive affirmations on people which is naturally uplifting. I felt very
experienced in this area. I thought I knew when the spirit was with me and I
spoke as I felt directed. When my wife was pregnant I was giving her blessings
which talked about our baby and how it would be healthy and well. I was
convinced our baby was going to be a boy and I blessed my wife and child with
all the love that I felt.
When my wife and I
went to our first scan at the hospital expecting to see our baby, the screen
was black. We were told that there was no heartbeat. We were informed when she
had miscarried, so all of those feelings and blessings just couldn’t be true. I
was blessing a baby that was already gone. So what were all those feelings and
assurances I felt? Now I know it was nothing more than my own desires and
wishes. It shook my faith and I never gave another blessing to anyone again. I
have never accepted a blessing from anyone else either. I had lost my faith in
blessings but I still had faith in prayer. So I prayed that my wife would be
comforted and helped through this heartbreaking time. She wasn’t comforted or
helped because she ended up going through an agonising miscarriage as her body
passed the pregnancy sack. She was in hospital twice in horrendous physical
pain until it all finally passed. We didn’t have time then to deal with the
emotional grief, which came later.
The same week that
she was released from hospital she had a Church member visit. She was told that
even though she had miscarried it was her duty to procreate, so to try again. A
few weeks later when my wife wasn’t coping well the same person told her to not
look back anymore. ‘Look what happened to Lot’s wife when she looked back, she
was turned into a pillar of salt’. This is just typical of the harmful damage
people can do when they feel like they are acting with the spirit. I was told
our baby was too precious for earth so that’s why we miscarried. None of this
provided us with any sort of comfort. We continued to try for a baby but it
just wasn’t happening for us. The next piece of advice given to us was that we
needed to come back to church and put ourselves in a position for God to bless
us. Oh, so it’s our fault for not conceiving now is it? We aren’t attending Church so we aren’t going to be blessed. How do they really believe that logic?
The truth is we
couldn’t attend a church where everyone else seemed to be falling pregnant or
hearing all about how we need to raise families up unto the Lord. The Mormon Church
is very much family focused and we felt beaten over the head with it during
lessons, talks, and every time someone tried to put a spiritual band aid on our
miscarriage. Anytime members can’t answer a difficult question I hear some
cheap tagline like, ‘God works in mysterious ways’. That isn’t good enough for
me anymore.
Since then we have
been inactive from the Church for about six years. It really took me stepping
well away from it so see it for what it is. I don’t see anything that it claims
to be anymore. I see control, indoctrination, and arrogance. It’s taken me a
long time to really undo its grasp on me. I was thirty years old when I had my
first proper alcoholic drink, and even then I felt a slight twinge of guilt. I
quickly shook it off because I realised how infantile it is to be made to feel
like a naughty child when I’m a grown man. Since that time I have had to
recondition my brain to be free thinking. I no longer give the Church’s opinion
on certain matters like I used to, I give my own.
The process of
untangling its sticky web wasn’t an easy one. It took time to eradicate its
guilt which would creep up on me unexpectedly as I changed my lifestyle. It was
also hard accepting that I no longer had the comfort of being one of the elect,
chosen to hold the priesthood and sealed to my family for time and all
eternity. I don’t rely on prayer or blessings when things go wrong anymore. I
don’t even have faith in an afterlife, which was perhaps the hardest pill to
swallow. I feel like I’ve been told that all my friends were imaginary, and I’ve
only just realised that I’m on my own.
I don’t know
anything for sure, but never again will I allow myself to be tricked into
religion or take people’s feelings and testimonies as truth or fact. Most
members will say ‘I know it’s true, rather than I believe it’s true’. I don’t
know it and I don’t believe it anymore. All I trust now is what I actually know
for sure. I’m done relying on my gut to think for me, now I use my brain and
seek actual evidence. It’s not as bleak as I first thought either. There is a
wonderful beauty knowing that we, against all the odds are living here on planet
earth in a beautiful vast, wondrous universe. Maybe we all just have to find
our own meanings and purposes in life.
Even if God does
exist, would a supreme being really be easily offended by petty little earth
activities when children are starving in a world of corruption and injustice?
Do you really think a god cares what a teenager or anyone else for that matter
gets up to in the privacy of their bedrooms? Does a supreme being care if I
wear a Greenday Hoodie or listen to Metallica? Does God frown down at me when I
have a cup of coffee? Does God really answer the prayers of privileged Mormon
kids that have lost their car keys, while ignoring starving children in the
world? If God loves us all beyond imagination and is full of mercy then won’t
we all be saved in the next world anyway? None of it makes much sense to me
anymore. Right now I’m just accepting life for what it is and I’ll live it
however I choose to live it because as far as anyone knows, we are only here
once.
A recent talk by a
Mormon apostle asked the following question: ‘If you choose to become inactive
or to leave the restored Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, where
will you go? What will you do?’ Well, I
have chosen to leave the Church and I will go wherever my free thinking mind
wants to go, and do whatever my free thinking mind wants to do.
I can’t tell you
how liberating it feels to have the weight of Mormonism lifted from my
shoulders now that I have left its clutches. I live my life for myself and not
for the Church. I no longer feel its guilt, I no longer feel shame or unworthy,
and I no longer have to feel uncomfortable about its sexist and homophobic
views, because they no longer represent me.
Now that my name
has been removed from its records I can also speak freely about my experiences
in the Church without it invoking disciplinary action against me. When it was
confirmed that my name was removed I had a few minutes where I felt solemn. I
had invested so much time and energy into it over the years and it really was a
way of life for me. Now I had undone everything. Again, this shows how deeply
rooted this religion embedded itself into me. When I realised this I finally
felt like a leaf on the wind. I was free.
Some members say to
me, ‘you’re still a good person though’, like morality is only exclusive to
Mormons. If anything I am a better person today because I’m not judgemental and
I’m far more accepting of alternative lifestyles and people. I know that the
Church will view me as lost, or apostate, or the nicer members will be worried
about my salvation. That reality only exists in their minds though. Just
because that’s what they believe does not make it true. It’s impossible for
them to see any other view unless they break out of the delusion and reevaluate
it with fresh eyes. Most of my true friends left the Church for their own
reasons. People that gossiped about me or treated my family like crap over the
years are still going out feeling better than everyone else. This fact alone
speaks volumes to me. Of course not all the members are like that. I know there
are genuinely great people in the Church who do a lot of good and are living
happy, fulfilled lives. I don’t wish to offend them or insult their beliefs,
but I also feel the need to express how Mormonism has affected my life because
it clearly has. I feel like I was hoodwinked for so many years and I will never
get that time back.
Whether I have
succeeded or not, I’ve tried my best to focus only on some of my own personal
experiences with the Church rather than critiquing its doctrines and the
organisation as a whole. I hope my Church friends won’t be too offended and I
hope my non-Church friends won’t find all of this too insane.
I’m thirty-five
years old now and I still have dreams that I’m back on a mission, trying to be
obedient and trying desperately to get home.
