My Daughter's Courageous Post About Contemplating Leaving the LDS Church

My eldest daughter recently published a very thoughtful post on her blog about possibly leaving the LDS Church. I invite readers of my blog to read her essay and, if so inclined, to leave comments and words of encouragement as she continues her journey.

Here's the link: Time to Be Honest About My Church.

My daughter and her husband and her two little children (Batman and sister behind him) are pictured at right in the Christmas family photo.

Resignation: Doctrine Cannot Be Separated from History

I left off my last post by describing the angry feelings of betrayal that I experienced after having read Fawn Brodie’s No Man Knows My History. It wasn’t so much that I was reading things I’d never heard of before – although there were more than a few surprises. What Brodie did is look at Joseph Smith’s history and the early history of the institution of the LDS Church (which are pretty much one and the same) from a different perspective. She told the story that chapel Mormons never heard. The other side of the story. And it was pretty compelling.

In early 2012, I read D. Michael Quinn’s two books about Mormon Heirarchy, i.e., Mormon Heirarchy: Origins of Power and Mormon Heirarchy: Extensions of Power. As was the case with Brodie, Quinn revealed a very-well researched and documented account of early Church history that was very different than the one I was accustomed to reading. Also like Brodie, there were more than a few arched eyebrow moments when I read something I’d never heard of before but that was clearly solid history. 

Reading these books helped me to shake myself loose from the vestiges of belief I still had. As I expressed in my last post, my problem was that many of the core LDS doctrines – particularly those preached before the Nauvoo period – had made sense to me. The restoration argument was very plausible. The coming forth of the Book of Mormon and the doctrines it taught were plausible. Other doctrines developed by Joseph Smith were not only plausible but were attractive to me. 

But as I read, the evidence mounted. And so did my anger. 

• Anger at the Church for deliberately deceiving its members about who Joseph Smith was and what he did during the 1820’s. 
• Anger at the Church for deliberately and consciously advancing one story of how the Book of Mormon was translated while history reveals a different account (the seer stone in the hat method). 
• Anger at the Church for concealing how early “revelations” were later changed to accommodate evolving doctrinal developments. 
• Anger at the Church for deliberately glossing over glaring “problems” with the Book of Mormon that were presented to the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve as early as the 1920’s (by B.H. Roberts).
• Anger at the Church for deliberately concealing information about Joseph Smith’s evolving doctrine of polygamy that began in the early Kirtland period.

I could go on and on. 

It was this evidence and this anger at being duped in so many ways that made it much easier for me to sever the remaining cords of belief in an institution and belief system to which I had given much of my life.

The First Vision? How could I believe in this doctrine if Joseph Smith himself described it in at least four different ways? How could I believe in this doctrine if his family knew nothing about it or about the visitation of Moroni in 1823? Rather, the evidence pointed to the fact that this doctrine, like all of Mormonism, was evolving into something quite different than it had originally been conceived of being. 

The Book of Mormon? How could I believe in the divine origin of the Book of Mormon if Joseph Smith himself never preached from it and uttered his thanks to be rid of the last remaining written manuscript when it was put in a time capsule in the Nauvoo House? How could I continue to believe in it when the church that evolved in the 1830’s and early 1840’s bore little resemblance to that described in the Book of Mormon? 

Joseph Smith? As the evidence mounted, I found a Joseph Smith emerging that was very different than the one depicted today by the Church. What was I to think of him? 

No matter how much some of the “doctrines of the restoration” are appealing, they cannot be divorced from the poisoned well from which they originated. (And let me state that I am not interested in debating the matters I have referenced in this post. The purpose of this post is to tell my story, not to prove it to someone else.)

When I was investigating the Church in 1983, I was once told that “it’s really very simple: if the Book of Mormon is true, then Joseph Smith was a prophet and the Church is what he said it is.” In 2011-2012, I reversed this pithy little statement: If the Book of Mormon is not what it purports to be, then Joseph Smith was not a prophet. Conversely if Joseph Smith was not what he purported to be, then the Book of Mormon is – ultimately – a fraud. In both these cases, if Joseph Smith was not what he purported to be, then the “doctrines” that he advanced were not revelations from God. It’s really very simple.

That’s what I told myself in the spring of 2012. I came to a point where I told myself that I didn’t have all the answers, but I didn’t need all the answers. I knew enough to know that Mormonism is no more “true” than is Methodism, or Presbyterianism, or Catholicism, or any number of other “-isms.” In anything, Mormonism was even “less true,” because, ultimately, it is based on historical lies and deceit. No matter how appealing some of the Church’s doctrines may be, these teachings cannot be separated from the historical context in which they arose.

Thus were any remaining, lingering threads of belief I had in the Mormon Church severed … forever.

Resignation: An Expression of the Divine

In my last post, I described how angry I became when I first started really confronting the early history of the LDS Church in November 2011. This confrontation proved to be crucial in the process of severing all spiritual, emotional and intellectual ties to the Church. What I learned is that LDS doctrines, however appealing, cannot be separated from the historical circumstances in which they arose or were formed.

Appealing doctrines?

Yes. I was an adult convert to the LDS Church, and among the reasons I joined at age 24 was because the doctrine, in the words of Joseph Smith, “tasted good to me.” 

In January 2011, when I was beginning the process of coming out, I wrote a post on my Invictus Pilgrim blog that explained how I felt about some of the Church’s doctrines. The following is an edited version of that post, which was entitled “An Expression of the Divine.” I would like to stress that what I wrote almost 3-1/2 years ago was a reflection of where I then was, not where I am today. 

*********************

The title of this post comes from a statement written by artist and writer Wes Hempel, with whom I had struck up a correspondence.  He had used this phrase in a discussion we were having of President Boyd K. Packer’s recent General Conference remarks. “If homosexuality is not a choice but is instead intrinsic,” Wes wrote, “the inescapable conclusion is that homosexuality is not ‘impure’ or ‘unnatural.’  Rather, it must be just another aspect of God’s creation ... [which] alongside heterosexuality … must be an expression of the divine.”

I would like to use Wes’ words to frame an articulation of some thoughts I have had recently.

I should first of all say that I was not born into the LDS Church.  I encountered Mormonism shortly after I graduated from college at a time when I was searching for meaning and direction in my life.  I had been raised in the Catholic Church, but had joined a mainline Protestant church when a senior in high school. Later, I had a brief but satisfying affair with the Episcopal Church.  By the time I met the missionaries in 1983, I was flirting with going back to the Catholic Church.

In college, I took a number of religion and philosophy courses that both challenged and enriched the belief structure I had been raised with and which I had later added to and modified.  I guess you could say that I was somewhat unusual for someone my age, in that I had devoted a lot of thought, time and effort to the study of organized religion in an effort to find my place in the world. So when I was introduced to Mormonism, several of its doctrines strongly appealed to me (not to mention its claim for absolute truth), such as the following:

The Eternal Nature of Man.  Unlike any other religion or belief system, Mormonism taught that each human being is an eternal person, that before being clothed in a mortal body, my spirit had existed in a “pre-existent” state and that, furthermore, my spirit had in that state been clothed in a spiritual body.  "All spirit is matter,” wrote the Prophet Joseph Smith, “but it is more fine or pure, and can only be discerned by purer eyes … This spirit element has always existed; it is co-eternal with God.”

Furthermore, Mormonism taught that, prior to being organized by God into my spirit body, the “essence” that is me existed as intelligence.  “We know,” wrote Joseph Fielding Smith, “that there is something called intelligence which always existed. It is the real eternal part of man, which was not created nor made. This intelligence combined with the spirit constitutes a spiritual identity or individual.”

The Godlike Nature of Man.  Closely connected with the Mormon teaching that we are spirit children of God is the belief that, because of this heritage, we possess attributes of God within our very spirits.  “Our spirit birth gave us godlike capabilities,” wrote President Lorenzo Snow. “We were born in the image of God our Father; He begot us like unto Himself. There is the nature of deity in the composition of our spiritual organization; in our spiritual birth our Father transmitted to us the capabilities, powers and faculties which He Himself possessed -- as much so as the child on its mother's bosom possesses, although in an undeveloped state, the faculties, powers, and susceptibilities of its parent.”

The Dual Nature of Mortal Man.  Mormonism also simply cut through the Gordian knot when it came to the age-old debate among philosophers as to the true nature of man:  was the body merely a corrupting force of our “true” selves, our “spirit”, and thus something to be despised?  No, answered Mormonism.  We were sent here to this earth so that our spirits could be clothed in a mortal body which the spirit would, during the resurrection, reclaim and which would then be made immortal and glorified to a degree that would bring each of us eternal happiness and joy.

The Purpose of Life.  Far from proclaiming mortality to be a vale of tears, Mormon scripture shouted the truth that “Adam fell that men might be, and men are that they might have joy”! (Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 2:29)

The Destiny of Man.  Mormonism also rejected the false dichotomy of heaven vs. hell.  In a blaze of light and revelation, Joseph Smith’s vision of the degrees of glory, an account of which appears in Section 76 of the Doctrine and Covenants (Mormon scripture), consigned the traditional Christian view of heaven and hell to the dustbin of history.  Except for “sons of perdition” (which I will not address), all will be resurrected and eventually inherit a degree of glory in the eternities that is commensurate with and designed to give ultimate joy to each of God’s children.

These doctrines lie at the heart of what Mormons alternately call “The Restoration”, the “Gospel” or the “Restored Gospel.” Each term refers to truths that Mormons believe are eternal but which had been lost for centuries due to apostasy within the Christian world.  These doctrines, among others, are what have led thousands, including myself, to join the Church.

The "Family" Trumps All

These doctrines, however, are given only passing reference in the Church today.  To the extent they are considered or referred to, whether “in the trenches” (in ward sacrament meetings or Sunday School lessons) or from the pulpit of General Conference, they typically serve as backdrop to what in my view has become the all-important, all-consuming Doctrine of today’s Church:  The Family.

The Church’s emphasis on “the Family” colors and drives every activity in and aspect of the Church, from Family Home Evening to Proposition 8 to the ordinances of the LDS temples.  It is this emphasis that, I submit, has led to the Church’s historically harsh position with respect to homosexuality and its involvement with several initiatives to fight gay marriage.

I believe it is also this emphasis, coupled with the Church’s (commendable) emphasis on meeting the temporal needs of God’s children through practical service and humanitarian work, along with its corporate approach to missionary work and temple “work”, that has led to the “pedestrian-ization” of the Gospel, particularly as the Church continues to seek to be accepted into the North American mainstream.

Even though I have become disaffected with orthodox Mormonism and the mainstream church, I still believe in the doctrines I have described above.  I still believe that these doctrines are like rich veins of precious philosophical ore, waiting to be explored and mined.  I feel this is particularly true with respect to how these doctrines relate to the concept of homosexuality.

I’d like to issue a challenge Mormon thinkers to consider this question: If one is born gay (which I very definitely believe is the case), and if one accepts the premise that homosexuality is not some sort of biological abnormality such as Down Syndrome but rather a reflection of one’s pre-mortal identity (which I believe), then what implications do these postulations have concerning the nature of God, a gay pre-mortal identity (and how such an identity was acquired) and (perhaps most importantly) a post-mortal gay identity?

In the meantime, I wish to simply adopt Wes Hempel’s statement as an expression of my own personal creed:  I was born gay, and this is not only a part of my eternal identity, but also an expression of the Divine.

********************

In my next post, I will explore how confronting the history of the LDS Church and of Joseph Smith allowed me sever any remaining emotional, spiritual or intellectual ties to the Mormon Church.

Resignation: Confronting Church History

This is another in a series of posts chronicling my decision to formally resign my membership in the LDS Church and my confrontation with Church history and doctrine that followed my resignation.

I had submitted my letter of resignation. I had formally left the LDS Church, but I knew when I resigned that the Church, or rather a lingering - albeit tattered - belief in the Church, had not left me. As I've written in the previous posts in this series, when I resigned, I still didn't know what I believed about Joseph Smith, about the history of the Church, about the Book of Mormon, about temples, about a number of things. 

Leaving Was Not Enough

I was an adult convert to the Church. I had invested 28 years of my life in believing the Mormon Church was what it claimed to be. I found that it was one thing to leave a church that I felt had turned its back on me and in which I could no longer fit; but it was quite another to stop believing in things I had ardently believed, that I had taught my children, of which I had born testimony, that had seemed so rational and so believable for so long. Relinquishing long-held beliefs was far more difficult than mailing a letter to Church headquarters.

For a while after resigning, I thought that I could just leave these beliefs behind. But merely relinquishing them somehow felt like I imagined excommunication would feel like ... in that I hadn't "acted" of my own volition, but had merely "reacted." 

Relinquishment wasn't enough. I had to go back and face the beliefs and, if necessary and appropriate, renounce them, thereby paving the way (as it turned out) for healing from what the beliefs had done to me. I say "if necessary and appropriate" because I did not start out with an "agenda." I merely opened my mind, and the result followed of its own accord.

Opening My Mind

In the 28 years that I had been an active member of the LDS Church, I had never allowed myself to read anything that was even remotely "anti-Mormon." Over the years, I had read widely about the history of the Church, about Joseph Smith and about the doctrines of the Church, but all from sources that were sympathetic to the belief that the Church and Joseph Smith were what and whom they purported to be. 

I knew a lot about the history of the Church. I'm not trying to be boastful, but merely state a fact. I had read virtually every "friendly" biography of Joseph Smith, including Bushman's Rough Stone Rolling. I had read biographies of almost all of the presidents of the Church as well as many other books about the history of the Church. I had believed the Brethren when they had said that "detractors" from Joseph Smith and "apostates" had been led away to write and speak untruths about Smith and the Church, both during his lifetime and later. 

After all, if Joseph Smith really was what he proclaimed himself to be, and what many believed him to be, then it makes a certain amount of sense that many would seek to destroy the Prophet's reputation and cast doubt on his prophetic calling. The same could be said of Brigham Young, Smith's successor as president of the Church. The history of the Church as presented by those friendly to it made sense - in a sort of a way - and I would not entertain any notions that this history was not what it purported to be.

Starting to Read

The first book I picked up after I resigned of which I read parts was Under the Banner of Heaven. Mark had recommended it to me, but I quickly lost interest in the modern-day polygamists described in the book. What I found interesting was its depiction of the history of polygamy in the Mormon world. On 22 November 2011, I made the following entry in my journal:

“I am now reading Under the Banner of Heaven, which is basically about polygamous sects but also goes into the history of the Mormon Church. I thought I knew just about all there was to know about church history, but I read some things yesterday I had never heard of. Needless to say, they challenged my understanding and knowledge of church history. I’m only scratching the surface, I’m sure. I have quite a journey ahead of me. 

“As I was thinking about this yesterday, I realized that I would never have ‘gone there’ in the past – even though I considered myself a ‘liberal Mormon,’ [at least intellectually] because it would have been too challenging. I couldn’t afford to shake my testimony – it was the one thing I clung to in order to bring sanity to my life of denial, conflict and shame. Paradoxically, it was also the one thing that tied me to my life of denial, conflict and shame.”

No Man Knows His History

Later in November, I started reading Fawn Brodie's landmark biography of Joseph Smith, No Man Knows My History. I well remember going into Barnes and Noble and almost feeling like I was purchasing pornography – it was so taboo. Or at least in my mind at that ime. 

I had heard of her book, of course; but I had also read Hugh Nibley's rebuttal as well as other negative commentary written by defenders of the Church. It was the typical sort of stuff: slinging mud at the author, but leaving her basic message unchallenged. Brodie, however, was no "anti-Mormon." At the time she initially wrote History, she was a young historian (in the 1940's), but she would later achieve fame and recognition for her landmark biography of Thomas Jefferson. 

What I read in Brodie's book infuriated me. I don't know now many times I said to Mark (who is not, nor ever has been, Mormon), "I was so gullible!" Brodie told the other side of the story that had been constantly denigrated by the Church and its various apologists. But she also told the story that was never in the official or friendly accounts because it was too damning. I felt like I had been duped. Mislead. Lied to. And I didn't like it.

Resignation: Grace and the Courage to Be

“Sometimes it happens that we receive the power to yes to ourselves, 

that peace enters into us and makes us whole, 

that self-hate and self-contempt disappear, 

and that our self is reunited with itself. 

Then we can say that grace has come upon us.”

“The courage to be is the courage to accept oneself, 

in spite of being unacceptable.”

~ Paul Tillich

This is another in a series of posts chronicling my decision to resign my membership in the LDS Church and to confront the historical origins of the Church. As mentioned in my last post in the series, the first Circling the Wagons conference was going on while I in the process of resigning. I wrote this post in November 2011 about the interfaith service that was held as part of the conference.

The above two quotes were both written by Paul Tillich, a noted Protestant theologian and philosopher, and I think they aptly and beautifully capture much of what was expressed and felt at this past weekend’s “Circling the Wagons” LGBTQ conference, sponsored by MormonStories.org and held here in Salt Lake City.

The conference was successful beyond expectations by any of a number of measures. The Deseret News pegged attendance at 300. I personally know of attendees who had come from Washington, D.C., North Carolina, Massachusetts, Texas, Illinois, California, Nevada, Idaho and Oregon, along with many from Utah. In addition to gays and lesbians who attended, there were many, many family members and other members of the Church who attended in order to learn and support loved ones.

Throughout the weekend, many plain and precious truths were conveyed, hearts were touched, friendships formed, and love shared. As was expressed by a number of presenters and attendees throughout the weekend, we all felt like we were part of something historic.

The Interfaith Service was no exception, though it was somewhat discordant. There we were, sitting in Skaggs Memorial Chapel at the First Baptist Church, singing LDS hymns. The organist was a gay Mormon who will be married to his partner this week. The chorister was a straight LDS woman. The man who conducted the service is an openly gay member of his ward. The congregation consisted of gay men, lesbian women, families with children, parents of gay children, straight men and women, friends of their gay brothers and sisters.

We heard inspiring talks given by Kevin Kloosterman, an LDS bishop who had traveled from the Midwest to attend and speak at the conference, by Rev. Mary June Nestler, the Canon of the Episcopal Diocese of Utah, and by the Rev. Jimmy Creech, who had been one of the keynote speakers the day before.

Though there were many notable moments, the highlight of the service for me came when Julia Hunter, a lesbian Mormon who is a professional violinist, was joined by a young gay man who was long-time friend and fellow musician (Julia laughed when she said they had gone to the prom together in high school) to play a piano-violin duet of a medley of several Mormon hymns. As I sat there, transported by the beauty of the music, I contemplated the words of the hymn Julia was playing, “There Is Sunshine In My Soul Today.”

In the row in front of me, I saw sights that are common in any LDS sacrament meeting:  a couple, sitting close together with one’s arm around the other person in an expression of tenderness and love. Next to them, I saw a young couple, the flower of LDS youth. As the young man leaned forward in the pew, the other’s fingers ran up and down his back – a sight seen over and over again in wards throughout the Church.

This scene was different, however, for both of these couples consisted of gay men. The older couple, partners, expressed deep love and affection as one rested his body within the embrace of the other’s arm. The younger couple, boyfriends, were both returned missionaries, both handsome, clean cut young men. One had given the opening prayer for the service. Halfway through “Sunshine”, after his boyfriend had been gently running his fingers up and down his back, he sat back up in the pew and put his arm around his boyfriend.

It was scenes throughout the weekend of gay couples openly expressing affection for each other - scenes that we would take for granted in an LDS meetinghouse among heterosexual couples - that I think was one of the most powerful messages of the conference. Even for us gay folks, as well as our straight allies, these scenes took aback a bit at first; we're not accustomed to seeing this in a "church" or "LDS" setting; but then we think, "Yeah, this is what it's all about," and it just seemed (as it was) so natural, so right, and yet such a powerful representation of what all the talks, songs and discussion are all about.

These were the thoughts running through my mind while the violin and piano played on, transporting all of us higher and higher with beautiful musical runs that evoked feelings of ascension and transcendance. It was during these moments that I felt what I am sure most people in that room felt:  a spirit of love, a spirit of peace, a spirit that confirmed that we are loved and accepted for who and what we are, a spirit that drove away self-hatred and self-contempt. It was, as Paul Tillich wrote, a moment of grace, and I think we all felt it.

I could write about what Rev. Nestler had to say about the Episcopal Church’s journey to full acceptance of gays and lesbians. I could write about the powerful words Jimmy Creech shared about no one having the power or the authority to tell us who we cannot love. I could write about those things. But what I personally think was most memorable about that service was what we felt … as a group of gay and lesbian Mormons, together with their friends, families and allies, gathered to worship together in a small chapel in a Baptist Church in Salt Lake City … and what we left with:  a greater courage to be, to accept ourselves in spite of being unacceptable.

Postscript: At the time I wrote this in November 2011, I still very much considered myself to be a Mormon - culturally if not literally. This was before I started investigating and confronting the history of the Church, before I became disillusioned and angry at lies and deception and betrayal.

Resignation: "There is No Home For You Here"

This is the fourth in a series of posts that chronicle my decision to resign my membership in the LDS Church and my confrontation with Church history that followed. Unlike the previous three posts in this series that were originally published on another blog in the spring of 2013, this is a new post.

Within a week or so of mailing my letter of resignation, I received a form letter from the Membership Records Department of the Church:

Perhaps I should say again that I didn't feel I could just go inactive in the Church. For me, it was a matter of personal integrity. I just didn't want the feeling that I was responsible to some church authority for the way I was living my life; nor did I want the feeling of looking over my shoulder to see if some church leader was going to send me notice of a disciplinary hearing. I wanted to be free of all that. Period. 

I know other gay Mormon men who have been excommunicated but still believe in the Church. I know of others who were excommunicated and have nothing whatsoever to do with the Church. Others have simply gone inactive; they are still members but don't associate with the Church. Still others have, like me, chosen to resign their membership in the Church. I respect each of these decisions; it is a very personal matter. I have never regretted my decision to resign.

As the above letter describes, the Church doesn't give up easily. Resignation requests are always referred to local church leaders, i.e., the bishop and stake president. By the time my then-current bishop was contacted, I had already moved in with Mark, but I deliberately used my old address. Sure enough, the bishop came by the house and talked to my old housemate, who assured him that I was deadly serious and totally confident in my decision to resign.

So, a couple of weeks later, I received the following letter from the bishop that had been sent to my old address:

Enclosed with this letter, however, was a personal one, hand-written by my former bishop. I have to say I was deeply touched by and appreciated his words and the sentiment behind them:

It was somewhat ironic that the letter was dated the day my daughter Hannah was married in the Salt Lake Temple. Of course, I wasn't in the sealing room, but I was there when she came out, looking radiant. I didn't know until much later of the ordeal she experienced within her own heart and soul with regard to the temple. But she also didn't know until much later what was going on regarding my decision to leave the Church. 

My resignation also occurred in the midst of the first Mormon Stories Circling the Wagons Conference, an event which I helped plan and in which I participated. I will share some of my thoughts about that conference in the next post in this series.

In early December, I received the final letter:

Thus, the end of a 28-1/2 year period in my life. I didn't know what the future would hold, but I was confident that I had made the right decision.

The Mystical Bonds

This is the third in a series of posts, originally published in the spring of 2013, that chronicle my decision to resign my membership in the Mormon Church and my confrontation with Church history that followed.

It’s amazing, the power that myth has over us. My marriage to my former wife was, as I have previously described, the central myth of my life, in the sense that it gave it meaning, purpose and structure. She and I felt and believed that it was God’s will that we be together, and this belief was supported and sustained by what we viewed as powerful spiritual experiences prior to our marriage. In much the same way as the miracles of the Exodus created and sustained Israel for centuries, even millennia, these pre-marital spiritual experiences were the glue that held our marriage together and gave me the faith to keep moving forward despite considerable obstacles.

I realized as I was writing this post that there were no further powerful spiritual experiences after we married. As is the case with countless other myths, we looked back to those original experiences as definitive, regardless of subsequent circumstances. I also came to realize that had my wife and I married under “normal” circumstances, our marriage would likely have survived only a few years – if that long. We had virtually nothing in common outside of the Church, and then there was the fact that I was gay, trying (honestly, sincerely and desperately) to be heterosexual. 

As I have written, the central myth of our "celestialized marriage" was supported, sustained and controlled by another myth, i.e., the truthfulness of Mormonism. I could never allow myself to question the doctrine of Mormonism and thus the truthfulness of the Church, because doing so would threaten this central myth. 

So, even though I was deeply unhappy in the Church and there were many things about it that I did not like, I never allowed myself to “go there.” I couldn’t afford to shake my core testimony because it was the one thing I clung to in order to bring sanity and meaning to my life of denial, conflict and shame (as a gay man). Paradoxically, it was also the one thing that shackled me to my life of denial, conflict and shame.

My coming out was the A-bomb that dealt a critical blow to both my testimony and the central myth that had governed over 25 years of my adult life. But though mortally wounded, my internalized belief system in Mormonism clung to life. Though I had lost any belief at all in the divine calling of the Brethren (the highest-ranking leaders of the Church), there were certain things that were very difficult for me to let go of. I frankly didn’t know what I believed with respect to the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. I had no explanations of how both could not be what they purport(ed) to be.

And, not surprisingly, I found my belief in the temple sealing ordinances tenacious. The hold, the power, that the sealing bonds have on Mormons – whether currently practicing or not – is profound. Though there are many aspects of the modern “Mormon Myth,” I would submit that the concept of the eternal family lies at the center of the myth, in that it is the most powerful motivating force of the entire religion. And at the very heart of that center stands the temple, the nexus between mortals and the Gods where the sacred ordinances of eternal family creation are performed. 

So as I considered resigning, I was concerned about what effect this action might have on my already strained relationships with my children. Beyond this, I was concerned – at least for a time – about the temple ordinances that had “sealed” my children to me.  What effect would my resignation have on those ordinances, I wondered?  

But then, almost immediately, I realized that I was still giving credence to a belief system in which I had lost faith. I realized how deeply I had become enmeshed in a system that had taught me that my relationships with my children were dependent on rituals, rather than on strong, true and authentic emotions and experiences.

I pondered how I had bought into this system, which had encouraged me to subject my relationships with my children to its demands, that taught me to constantly judge my children and myself, that “ritualized” my relationships with them. How different things would be, I mused, if my religion emphasized that what “sealed” me to my children were not rituals in a building, but rather feelings of love and acceptance, of validation and caring, of tenderness and devotion.

And so, as the days rolled by in the summer of early fall of 2011, I examined my feelings anew. Why did I want to resign my membership? Because I felt like a hypocrite. Because I was tired of the feeling of looking over my shoulder, of receiving a letter summoning me to a disciplinary council. Because I knew instinctively that I needed to ‘throw off the chains with which I am bound,’ to use a scriptural term.

Beyond all of this, however, was the feeling of actually doing something proactively, rather than waiting for events to force my hand. Even though I still didn’t know what I believed about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, I knew I no longer wanted to be a part of the Church. I knew I needed to sever that tie in order to move on with my life.

And thus in late October 2011, I sat in front of my computer, staring at the blinking cursor. Then I typed the last line of my resignation letter.

 “As I am no longer a member, I want my name permanently and completely removed from the membership rolls of the church.”

I printed out the letter, checked it for errors, addressed the envelope and left both lying on my desk. I went outside for some fresh air. The enormity of what I was doing weighed upon me. I felt physically ill. Mark, who was preparing to leave for work, was consoling, comforting and supportive. He gently encouraged me to go ahead and mail the letter right away and get it behind me to put an end to the suffering I was experiencing.

After Mark left, I folded the letter, put it in the envelope, sealed it, and stared at it for a few moments. Then, I got in my car and drove to the post box down the street. I was afraid that if I left it for the mail carrier, I’d change my mind. I got out of the car, walked over to the box, pulled back the lid and dropped the letter in. As soon as I did so, my feelings of nausea and anxiety left. I took two deep breaths, got back in my car and realized as I was driving away that I felt wonderful. I have never, not even for a moment, regretted that decision.

Even so, I still had a lingering belief in the Book of Mormon and in Joseph Smith ... I decided I would simply let this belief lie for the time being. But that was soon to change.

Of Myths and Membership Records

This is the second in a series of posts, originally published in the spring of 2013 that chronicle my decision to resign my membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon).

In the months that followed my moving out of the family home, I ambivalated about the Church. Finally, I decided to move my records out of my old family ward (partly to remove myself from the jurisdiction of my former bishop and stake president), and this was a dry run at what would follow several months later. It was a big step for me; whereas my moving out of the family home had marked a physical separation from my wife and children, moving my records demarcated a spiritual separation of sorts.

Such a statement might be difficult for non-LDS readers to comprehend but would, I am sure, be totally understandable to Mormons. Why is this? Two primary reasons.  First, because conscious Mormons understand the mystical and myth-ical bond that is created by the sealing ordinances of the Mormon temple, whereby husbands and wives and their children are “sealed” together so that they can be an “eternal family,” i.e., not only a family in this life but in the after-life.

Secondly, if Mormons are anything, they are a record-keeping people. Unlike other churches that sorta kinda keep track of people (in a highly-decentralized, localized fashion) who are baptized, confirmed, etc., the Mormon Church has made a multi-faceted, scientific, highly-centralized discipline out of its record-keeping procedures. 

When converts are baptized, a record of their membership in the Church is processed and sent to Salt Lake City. When children are born and blessed, their names are enrolled on the records of the Church; when they are baptized and confirmed – thus officially becoming members of the Church – this is duly noted.  When they receive priesthood offices, when they go on missions, when they get married – all these events are duly noted on their membership records. A family’s membership records are the physical (or, these days, the cyber-) manifestation of the mystical sealing power (of the Mormon Temple) that unites them.

In addition, one’s membership record is precisely that. Unlike Catholics or Lutherans or Methodists, for example, who can float from one parish or congregation to another without perhaps ever having to “prove” that they are such, or who can simply fade away if they no longer desire to practice their religion, the Mormon Church keeps tabs on its members. Once inscribed in the Great Book of Mormon Life (which Mormons perceive as being an earthly reflection of the heavenly Book of Life that figures prominently in the Book of Revelation), the name is forever there, unless voluntarily removed through resignation or involuntarily removed through death or excommunication.

Returning to the issue of myth, the hold, the power, that the sealing bonds have on Mormons – whether currently practicing or not – is profound, and I earlier used the term “myth-ical” deliberately, keeping in mind the following definitions of the word “myth”:

" ... a traditional or legendary story … with or without a determinable basis of fact or a natural explanation, especially one that is concerned with deities or demigods and explains some practice, rite, or phenomenon of nature”; “an unproved collective belief that is used to justify a social institution”; “a traditional, typically ancient story dealing with supernatural beings, ancestors, or heroes that serves as a fundamental type in the worldview of a people, as by explaining aspects of the natural world or delineating the psychology, customs, or ideals of society”; and, “a traditional sacred story, typically revolving around the activities of gods and heroes, which purports to explain a natural phenomenon or cultural practice.”

There are many aspects of the modern “Mormon Myth,” but I would submit that the concept of the eternal family lies at the center of the myth, in that it is the most powerful motivating force of the entire religion. And at the very heart of that center stands the temple, the nexus between mortals and the Gods where the sacred ordinances of eternal family creation are performed.

It was these types of concerns that tugged at me as I prepared to move my records, one more step away from the Mormon idyll. Even though my testimony of the Church’s modern leaders had taken a direct hit, I still felt the mystic chords of myth pulling at me as I took this step, an experience which would be repeated in a few months' time.

I had to go to my new ward to initiate the record transfer, and I knew what that would mean: a visit from my new bishop. Sure enough, he called to make an appointment and came to see me, an experience that I wrote about on my old Invictus Pilgrim blog and republished recently on this blog. He was a good man. He tried to understand, but I could tell he had totally missed the point when, after a two-hour-long discussion (half of which was spent by him trying to get me to admit that I am gay), he asked me how he could help me "get back to the temple." I sighed. I never went back to church.

Still, I couldn’t bring myself to formally sever my ties with the Church and all that went with that: membership, priesthood, temple sealings, etc. I thought I could just go inactive. Then I met Mark, and all of that changed. I fell head over heels in love with him, and he with me. I felt that I had found my soul mate. It wasn’t too long before I moved in with him. I was officially “living in sin.” I was also in the middle of what was quickly becoming a very messy divorce. I had to consider the very real possibility that I might be summoned before a disciplinary council ...

I had already decided that if I was summoned to a disciplinary council, I would immediately resign my membership rather than face the indignity of investigation, judgment by people who had absolutely no connection to me, and excommunication. There was no way I would submit myself to that. But I gradually came to feel that, for once in my life, I should be proactive, rather than waiting for external forces to compel me to do something.

Thus, I found myself sitting one late October day in 2011, staring at my computer, feeling sick to my stomach. The cursor blinked. I typed the second sentence of my letter to Church Headquarters:

“I hereby withdraw my consent to being treated as a member and I withdraw my consent to being subject to church rules, policies, beliefs and ‘discipline.’”  

To be continued ...

Why I Left the Mormon Church

I originally published this post on my "Joseph's Journeyings" blog (now closed) over a year ago. I have been thinking about re-posting it for some time, and recent events in the Mormon world - i.e., the possible excommunications of John Dehlin and Kate Kelly - have prompted me to go ahead and republish a series of posts addressing why I left the Mormon Church and why I joined it in the first place. 

I met John Dehlin at the first Mormon Stories Conference in Salt Lake in June of 2011, an event that left a deep impression on me while I was trying to figure out how I felt toward the Church. About a month later, over lunch with John at Maddox's in Brigham City, the concept of the first Circling the Wagons Conference was born. Over the following months leading up to the conference, I learned first-hand of John's deep commitment to the Mormon LGBTQ community. I am deeply grateful to John for what he has done for this community and the impact he has had on me personally. Thank you, John.

****************

As I sat at my desk in October 2011, my laptop in front of me, I felt sick. My chest was constricted, my breath short. I didn’t know what I had expected, but I don’t think I expected this. I was starting to feel nauseous.

This letter is my formal resignation from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, effective immediately.

I had wrestled with this decision for months. 

I stared at the screen in front of me, the cursor blinking, reflecting upon the events that had brought me to this point …

Background

I joined the LDS Church in Slidell, Louisiana on May 14, 1983. During the past two years, I have thought deeply about why I joined the Church.

Certainly one of those reasons is that I was gay. I wouldn't have used that word back then. But I knew I was "attracted to men," and I have chosen to use the word "gay" now because I feel I need to affirm who I really was then, and indeed who I was since birth. I was gay. But I wanted a family. I believed the Church when it said homosexuality could be overcome.

A little over a year after my baptism, I entered the MTC to prepare for a mission to France. I was 25 years old at the time; I would turn 26 in my first area. It was while I was in France that I learned that "the gay" cannot be "prayed away." I realized my attraction to men was something I would likely have to deal with my entire life.

I was married to a woman within a year of returning home and set forth on a journey that would see me striving to be a faithful priesthood holder, husband and father. I held many callings along the way, including Elders Quorum President, Young Men's President, Gospel Doctrine Teacher, Executive Secretary and member of the stake high council.

Meanwhile, my former wife and I welcomed six biological children into our family, later to be joined by three children adopted from Russia and a biological surprise, my youngest son. For all the years of my marriage, until shortly before the end (due solely to an inability to pay tithing), I held a temple recommend. Over the years, I researched and submitted over 10,000 names to the temple. I was a faithful member who was striving to do all that was expected of him in order to be a good Mormon.

All of that, however, was about to change.

Inborn Tendencies Toward the Impure and Unnatural

In October 2010, I was blasted out of the closet by a conference address given by President Boyd K. Packer, the second most senior apostle in the LDS Church, the man who would – if he outlived him – succeed President Monson as president of the Church. In the midst of a talk about moral purity, Packer had read the following sentences:

“Some suppose that they were preset and cannot overcome what they feel are inborn tendencies toward the impure and unnatural. Not so! Why would our Heavenly Father do that to anyone? Remember, He is our Heavenly Father.”

As I have written before, hearing these words set off an earthquake inside of me. Strong aftershocks came as I witnessed the uproar that followed his address and read the hateful homophobic comments that rank-and-file members of the Church wrote in social media in “support” of President Packer, such as the following post on the We Support President Packer Facebook Group:

"I love this! People try so hard to make sin acceptable and people are just giving in!!! What is next....crack head rights? Child molestation rights? Drug addict rights??? The only reason why gays fight so hard for 'rights' is because they KNOW it is wrong!!! They are just trying to make it better so they don't feel so guilty! The church is the one thing in this world still pure and we will not bend to silly stupid people getting upset at the truth!"

When the dust settled, I had left the closet forever. I realized that I was no longer willing or even able to repress who I am, that my homosexuality is a fundamental part of who I am as a person, and that I was tired of feeling guilty and dirty about it, and feeling, in President Packer’s words, “impure and unnatural.”

Prophets, Seers and Revelators? Not so much.

But that was not all. I realized that my belief in several key tenets of Mormonism had also been shattered that day. I no longer believed that the leaders of the LDS Church were what they claimed to be – inspired “prophets, seers and revelators” who spoke the mind and will of God. Certainly, I knew that Packer was not inspired because his statements had contradicted not only official Church policy, but also my own personal witness that God accepted and loved me for who I was – a gay man.  (Not a man with “same-gender attraction,” but a gay man.)

Belief in this keystone of Mormonism – continuous revelation – was further eroded as I reviewed, in the weeks following Conference, what various leaders of the Church (including and especially President Packer) had said over the years about homosexuality. How could leaders claim to be inspired with respect to homosexuality when the Church’s stance had so obviously softened over the years? And if they are so obviously not inspired when it comes to homosexuality, how could they claim inspiration with respect to other matters?

The next major casualty was the entire “Plan of Salvation” – the Mormon belief structure that surrounds the key questions of life. How could I, as a gay man who has finally accepted and affirmed himself, his sexuality and his identity, possibly continue to accept this structure that treats heterosexual marriage as the ultimate goal of my eternal existence?  

Furthermore, how could I possibly accept the insulting and degrading doctrine, voiced by some general authorities of the Church, that I will be miraculously “healed” of my homosexuality in the eternities (if I am “worthy”), much like a child with Down Syndrome or someone born with a physical handicap or deformity?

Beyond all of this, how could I possibly remain active in a religious organization that so obviously stood for much of what I’m not and that would excommunicate me for living the way I’m wired?

In the months that followed, my former wife asked for a divorce, I moved out, and I stopped going to church. I was ambivalent about Mormonism after having joined the LDS Church at age 24 and dedicating the next 28 years of my life to living the Mormon way of life, i.e., the Plan of Happiness (heterosexual marriage and faithful activity in the Church) and the Law of Consecration (devoting one’s entire life to the Church).

The Central Myth

I had never been particularly happy in most of the wards (congregations) of which I had been a member over the course of the previous 27 years - something I didn't really realize until after I left the Church - constantly feeling like I didn’t belong, constantly coming home frustrated from church, wondering why I went; but I had nonetheless clung to the (false) aphorism that the Church is perfect but the members are not. The Gospel is true, but Gospel Doctrine class may very well not be.

I had stayed all those years (I later realized) because the truthfulness of the Gospel was central to the truthfulness of the myth that lay at the heart of my marriage: that God had brought me and my ex-wife together and ordained that we be together not only in this life, but in the eternities. (I would later come to refer to this as my “Celestial Shotgun Marriage,” but that is a subject for another time.)

The point is, I never allowed myself to doubt the truthfulness of the Church because doing so would bring into question the central myth that had brought and sealed my wife and I together, despite our obvious differences, despite the fact that I was gay (marriage would cure me of that), and despite the fact that I detested many things about the Church. These thoughts were reflected in many passages in my journal over the past 18 months, including the following one:

"What kept me in the Church all those years was the mythological foundation of our marriage. The beliefs that we were chosen, special, yoked together by God himself - these are the beliefs I clung to, not a belief that Joseph Smith was a prophet, etc. I needed that myth to be true. It was the central pillar of my life, the thing that gave meaning (or so I thought) to my life. I clung to the Church because it supported that myth, not the other way around."

But all of that was changing.

To Be Continued …