Here’s a bit more on our current personal life as we step away from the LDS church, and what’s going on in my family.
I got rid of most of my LDS books. That took a few false starts as I was hesitant to do something final and let go of something that had been really meaningful to me. It also represented my intellectual connection to the church as well as reading goals ahead of me, but it felt really great. I am saving some, for now, that can be useful for research and evidence sake, to back up past doctrines that are being deleted from Mormon history.
I’ve been building a collection of Christian books to replace them, and I now have a good bookshelf worth of those, including several historical fiction novels for my kids, and Christian history books, which will be a major homeschool focus for us next year.
Last month I sent an email out to all my family whom I hadn’t told — this is what I was really dreading. It was fine; I got minimal response. And seeing them in person for the holidays wasn’t altogether much different. My family is never super interested in my life, so our interactions really aren’t based on that anyway (I guess what I’ve been complaining about for so long has turned out to be a good thing😂).
I have actually made some stronger connections with one brother, without us mentioning the letter at all. But that’s basically my approach — to nurture relationships focusing on other topics and work on developing common interests.
But another brother, it turns out, has been listening to and reading anti Mormon stuff for years! He could educate me on some things. For him, though, he prefers to stay.
My husband has not told his family yet, but has had many great conversations with friends.
We’ve made many new friends in the Christian / ex-Mormon world.
As far as attendance, we have two kids who want to attend the ward, so R is going with them. R is teaching mainstream Christian topics in the men’s group every so often; the bishop understands this arrangement. This might be changing soon; I told my daughter I don’t want her learning church history in primary next year. And R is having thoughts about living a double life, not wanting people to think he’s something that he’s not.
Then we go to The Well with two of our kids. It’s very much the highlight of our week. We have never looked forward to church every week like this! Maybe it’s just a honeymoon phase, but I could honestly go to church 3-4 times a week. It fills my bucket in such a powerful way.
We read the Bible for family scripture study now. It took R a few months to get off the Book of Mormon, but I think we did it. All of us but one have switched to Christian Standard Bible (and on my phone I use the NIV).
Yes, we drink the outlawed beverages and yes, we curse a bit more. I shopped on Sunday once for the first time ever. But we don’t plan on breaking LDS standards other than that. We very much intend to live biblical, Christian standards and keep up a clean, wholesome life. But we just don’t live rigidly.
We would also like to renew our vows and kind of redo our wedding. I could post separately on this, but suffice to say we have realized all the downsides of temple weddings, like being on an assembly line with a bland script identical to everyone else’s, not being able to say anything other than “yes,” not being able to invite who you want, not being able to wear what you want, etc. So at some point there will be a redo!
What we haven’t done yet is gotten rid of garments and temple clothes. I wanted to keep them for when we could do a bonfire ceremony, but now maybe not. Just haven’t felt a push to make that final leap yet. Maybe I just need to get it over with. But for now, they’re tucked away at the back of my closet.
Are we ready to appear on a ex-Mormon podcast? We were invited to be on someone’s show a few weeks ago. Not sure if that’s the right one for us though, and like I said, R hasn’t come out publicly yet. But we are working on starting our own podcast! (See video below)
I’ve come out most of the way. Like I said, my family knows. But not my in-laws. My ward can see I’ve been absent, but nobody has asked me about it. They can see I wear a cross, and if they’re on Facebook they can see some of my criticisms.
I think we will stay generally involved with the ward. It seems important to keep relationships and be involved in activities we can support. Like tonight we took some donations for a family in need over to the bishop’s house. It feels nice that we can stay involved in this way, even though he knows where I stand with the church. He hasn’t asked us much and he leaves us alone, but he is kind and gracious when we talk. He’s not in a rush to take away our recommend or anything.
I sang in the ward choir with my two daughters who attend the ward, for Thanksgiving and Christmas. So I attended those two days. I might continue to attend on holidays as long as we have family members attending, or family staying with us who want to attend. My sixteen year old is very insistent that she wants to keep attending the ward, even though she doesn’t have a strong testimony of it, but enjoys it anyway. We want to support her (and our older son), so we are not fully backing out at this point in our lives.
Now, I haven’t talked much about two things. I want to be transparent and share everything, so this can be kept as a record of someone making a very real transition, in real time.
The first is that we do have our oldest child out on a mission. If you know us in real life, you know this. If you don’t know us, it might come as a surprise. I haven’t said much because I want to protect his privacy, and I want to allow us some space to navigate that tricky situation, which will continue into navigating his return, his stay with us this summer and through 2025 at least.
This will be a crucial juncture for us. So, if you’re reading this will you please pray for us? To maintain family love and unity, for him to respect us and value our thoughts, to be prepared to hear them, for us to be wise and careful in our approach, and for him to know we love him. ❤️
I do have some feelings I’d be happy to share regarding this unfortunate timing for our faith transition. For one, I admit I struggle with Mom guilt because I can’t be the missionary mom I’m supposed to be. I don’t celebrate with him over the progress of his investigators, and a part of me just feels terrible saying that! But we have a good relationship, and we have good conversations when he calls each week. I guess we are lucky that he’s not too big on talking about it anyway. We mostly just chat about normal stuff.
Also I want to say that I do trust God, and I feel this was timed this way for a purpose. Our son chose for himself to serve a mission and that’s something he was going to do, so it was God’s mercy that I was able to let him go and feel comfortable enough at the time. Also, lately I’ve been feeling like it is God’s mercy to give us space to work through all the betrayal and anger while he’s away, so we can be ready to coexist really nicely when he returns. We will also be that much more versed in the Bible and able to tackle all his questions. We won’t push any of it on him, and we are totally prepared for him to remain faithful and prepared to work on keeping a strong relationship amid religious differences.
(I sent my son an email back in June describing all my issues with the church and my transition into my new church. We’ve been in contact about it, but mostly I can tell he doesn’t want to talk about it, so we don’t.)
Here’s a conversation about supporting our different kids with where each of them are personally in this journey, and thoughts on the missionary:
The second thing I haven’t talked much about on this blog is where I stand with the Book of Mormon.
I’ll have to make a separate post on all my thoughts, but I am agnostic on it. I still appreciate it as a beautiful book testifying of Christ, even if it’s fiction. And I’m very deliberate about this decision in letting it go because it’s meant so much to me; it was my tool of conversion to Jesus Christ when I was a teenager, and it got me through the hardest year of my life in 2018. This book has brought me to Christ time and time again, and I simply can’t let go of it without a thorough, fair examination.
I am fully aware of all the claims against it, but I kinda like William Davis’s explanations for anachronisms, and I allow space for it to be what it claims to be. I do not accept Joseph Smith as a prophet, though. But it’s possible he brought forth an inspired book and was never supposed to start a church. This theory would be consistent with the original First Vision account and the injunction given to Him to “pretend to no other gift” (other than translation) as well as explain why the Book of Mormon is such a Protestant book! It does not match the unique doctrines of the LDS church because the church part was a mistake as Joseph fell from God. This seems to be what Lynn Ridenhour thinks, who is a Baptist minister who preaches from the Book of Mormon!
I’m just saying it’s a theory. But if it’s all fake, I’m okay with that too.
Even if it’s a product of 19th century American Christianity, I don’t see the harm. Those are good sermons. Though I’m still picking them apart to see what might contradict the Bible.
My main problem with the Book of Mormon is that it’s missing a purpose. There’s nothing huge in it that adds value beyond the Bible. There’s nothing to really justify “taking this book to all the world.” (The greatest value seems to be in warning members of the LDS Church themselves!)
In fact, the net result for Book of Mormon readers in the LDS church seems to be a huge loss in biblical knowledge. I really take issue with the fact that even though it’s a beautiful book, having such a focus on it prevents LDS members from understanding the Bible, or even allowing space for the Bible to be reliable scripture. This is actually a major problem, as I see it. If they knew the Bible, they’d easily recognize how far off their religion is. And they’d know the true Jesus better. And if that’s the only evil of the book, it’s enough evil to call it out — 99% good but bearing such a rotten fruit as to ruin it. That would probably be my call, at this point. So there you have it.**
Even as I write this, today I spent an hour listening to anti-BOM claims and then an hour reading pro-BOM rebuttals. Evaluating the BOM is an ongoing project that might take me some time (and I’m open if any of you would like to contact me and let me know your thoughts!)
This morning I felt God tell me “It’s okay to let it go. Even if it’s good, it’s not necessary. It’s connected to a religion that actively lies and hurts people. You don’t need to keep any of it.”
In the end, it might be a good thing that I don’t have a strong opinion on the book. This helps me relate to both numos and exmos, and may give me some common ground with my son.
But I think it would be very beneficial to remain well versed in it, so I can base my dialogue with Mormons on something they believe in.
I’ll continue adding updates in the future. If you’re reading this, we’d love your prayers! If you are connected with me on social media, I’m happy to talk further privately on any of this!
**IMPORTANT NOTE: My commentary on the Book of Mormon keeping them from knowing the Bible is only relevant to the LDS branch of Mormonism. It is NOT relevant to the Church of Jesus Christ (Bickertonite) branch. I have actually been super impressed that their beliefs are much aligned with Biblical Christianity, and they use the Book of Mormon in line with that perspective as well! I am very happy to see a Mormon denomination using the Book of Mormon in proper balance with the Bible. ❤️
All I Possess 