by MaSt

Note

This story is not anti-Mormon literature or an attempt to slander the church.  Unless I expressly state that something is my opinion, multiple scholars have provided the statements made.  Historians who are LDS members as well as those who are of other faiths have published works establishing the facts discussed.  This paper is a result of a lifetime of sincere membership and over a year of deep study into the church from respected sources.

Purpose

I have spent my life living up until now in a state of self-persuasion and social engineering, which I have finally left.  My story's main purpose is to convey the feelings I have felt my whole life and the course of events leading up to leaving the LDS Church.  I hope to let all those I love and care about know that I have not made the decision lightly.

 

Growing Up

I was brought up as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (commonly called the Mormons or LDS Church).  I was "born in the covenant", meaning that my parents were sealed in the temple before I was born.  I was given a name and blessing as an LDS ordinance.  My father came from a Southern Baptist family but converted after he met my mother who was a dedicated LDS member who grew up far away from organized congregations of the LDS Church.  They both were very well founded in common Christian beliefs so my family was very strong in their faith in God.  I, on the other hand, never really felt a deep connection with God and just followed believing in Him because it seemed like I would be a better person for doing it.  I never truly understood who God was and what His teachings were.  Everyone who claimed to know God did so without any hard evidence.  Every time I prayed, I felt like I was just pumping myself up or saying what others around me wanted to hear.  When I read the scriptures I felt like I was reading philosophy according to men.  Even going to church felt like just a classroom for morals and an opportunity for social interaction.  Although those thoughts were always in the back of my head, I sincerely tried hard to gain faith in God.  As I learned about what was right and what was wrong, I never really accepted "because God said so" as a reason to do anything.  I have seen far too much corruption and too many misguided individuals causing hurt during my lifetime to accept a teaching just because someone whom I don't know said so.  I have always looked into my soul and society to come up with the values I followed. These have stayed with me to this day.  To understand me you need to understand my life and situation as I grew up.

 

My life so far has really only had three consistent items: my family, the church, and myself.  I moved every two or three years since my father was in the Air Force.  Community and friends were a constantly changing factor.  I knew I could always depend on my family's unconditional love and that the church I attended would be exactly the same everywhere we lived.  I could also depend on the fact that the church members would have the same general values as me.  At the same time I went to school every day in a different world and hung out with friends who had different values and morals.  As an observer I paid close attention to the things everyone did and what their outcomes were.

 

I have come to the conclusion that happiness is a factor of personal choice rather than religion, circumstances, or many other things people commonly attribute those feelings with.  Many members of the church perceive that they are happier than others.  The church teachings promote an unwavering source of happiness, which many individuals search for their whole life.  Members are told that God loves them no matter where they are or what situation they are in.  Whether it's true or not, this acts like a placebo, creating a situation that lets people stay happy unless they start to doubt. Then, after doubting they seemingly lose the unconditional happiness they believed was there (again, whether it is or not) which many attribute as proof that God is really there.  I believe the church has helped me find that unconditional happiness, but my happiness is not and never was based on the unconditional love of God.  I find intrinsic joy in taking whatever situation I'm in, good or bad, and improving on it.  Rather than leaning on the love of God, I focused on the joy I felt by doing things for myself and other people.  Even during the toughest times in my life, I have always somehow found happiness through working hard.  Some people who know me find that I always seem happy, always having a smile.  I attribute it 100% to my personal choice to be happy all the time.  Just like those who choose to believe in God, I simply choose to believe that I can be happy no matter what happens.

 

One of the biggest turning points for me was when one of my brothers went through a rebellious period in his life.  He decided that he wouldn't go to church anymore.  I saw this as my chance to also become free of religion.  As I was going to tell my opinion to my mother, my brother told me not to say anything.  I decided that would be smart so that I could see how it worked out for him.  There was a long trial that he went through, but he eventually came back into the fold, and it very positively changed his life.  At that point I decided I would stay the course, seeing how much his life had improved.  While the fact that someone changes his or her life is absolutely not proof of anything, I gave God the benefit of the doubt.  Many questions ran through my mind during this time.  How was I going to handle having kids?  What would I be able to use to teach them correct values?  Many new families flock to religion in order to provide their family with a good environment rather than basing it on true belief.  In preparation, I too decided that I would continue being a Christian so I could give good values to my children and receive answers of how I should teach and raise them during their trials.  Again, just the mere fact that religion is a good influence on people does nothing to prove the underlying beliefs. But since I didn't see any other way, I chose to believe God was there and that He would help my family and me.

 

Around the same time, I attended "Especially for Youth" (EFY), a LDS Church summer program located at colleges nation-wide that builds faith.  My brother and I flew up to Brigham Young University (BYU) in Provo, Utah, the heart of church education.  We attended and had a lot of fun, but I felt like it was too controlled of an environment to really trust.  Many of the speakers had funny and interesting stories, but my observations were that many of the kids that attended misinterpreted feelings of joy and happiness with "the spirit."  I never trusted my feelings when outside people tried to bring "the spirit" into the conversation.  Those who have studied psychology know that anyone can be conditioned to elicit an emotional response from any stimuli.  I believe that this is simply a behavioral control that equates emotions to God.  Many people claim that "the spirit" feels different than feelings of happiness. This is a subjective evaluation so I won't attempt to tell people what they are experiencing. It's not a subject to contend about.  That still doesn't mean that spiritual feelings can't be a conditioned response.  If there's one constant across all religions, it's that members are told that they will feel something special which I believe turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

 

Seminary is a required LDS Church youth program.  Outside of Utah, it usually involves meeting at 6 A.M. every weekday morning in a classroom setting with high school aged kids from church at the house of an adult member who was volunteered to teach them.  Over four years they would study the LDS scriptures, including The Bible, The Book of Mormon, The Doctrine and Covenants (D&C), and The Pearl of Great Price.  I learned a lot, but there's a bunch of history that I'll talk about later which has become highly distorted in the church's educational system.  That is not to say the teachers actively or knowingly distort anything; it just shows that most members don't know the church's true history and that the Church Educational System continues to ignore major facts and events in the LDS history.

 

One thing that I absolutely detested at church was the practice of parents going up on fast Sunday with their young children and whispering in their ears what to say in their testimony to the congregation.  I personally believe that this only serves as behavior conditioning and rarely reflects the true thoughts of the children while encouraging a mere copying of beliefs rather than a search for truth.  This, along with parents whispering what to say during a prayer, provides a foundation built on following the "vain traditions of our fathers."  My guess is that most church members have received this kind of conditioning.  My parents never took my brothers or me up to the front or whispered in our ears so that we would give a testimony at church.  They didn't agree with doing this with little children.  Instead they felt that a child should give his testimony only when he knows what he's doing, decides on his own that he has a testimony, and wants to tell this at church.  I have been very fortunate that my parents have always encouraged me in my personal, academic, social, and religious life to learn and grow for myself rather than relying on others.  That has undoubtedly been a foundation for me in finding happiness both in and out of the church.  Many members of the church try to cover this puppet monkey-see monkey-do mentality by claiming that they started out with their parents' testimonies and through certain events received their own.  I can never tell people that they didn't really gain their own testimony, but this is what I believe to generally be true.  This is very common in the church youth who leave home and are left to grapple with deciding what they believe.  Usually, they get some kind of a confirmation that everything they have learned up until this point of their lives is right.  I would argue that most people would use any excuse that confirms what they believe in order to appear as independent sources of truth rather than conduits.  It's much easier for individuals to accept everything they have been taught rather than to question everything and risk a major change in belief.  Most members of the church sincerely believe that if they lose their testimony they would fall into darkness and unhappiness.  The sad thing is that it may actually be true if they base their happiness on those beliefs.

 

During this time in my life I read one of the books that would influence me the most in regard to Christianity.  The Great Apostasy by James E. Talmage describes how the church, which Jesus Christ started, became corrupt and never found its way back.  Christianity has evolved over time through powerful men who have molded it into what they wanted or envisioned it to be.  The evidence presented is very well laid out, and I decided from that point on that either the LDS Church was the only true church or there was no true church out there.  I have always felt like the LDS Church has had a very strong position proving that most, if not all, churches today are creations of both intentional and unintentional corruption.  Of course, at this point I never even considered the possibility that other religions like Buddhism could have been true.  Like most people immersed in a certain religion, I simply disregarded all other religions as false simply for the reason that mine was "true" and theirs was "false."  Of course, now I see all religions on the same level of truthfulness.  There is absolutely nothing in this world to prove that one religion is any more truthful than any other.

 

My father has always said that changes in life are usually accompanied by major events that force change.  Much like when people learn to swim, they generally jump in quickly rather than easing down into the water.  It happens fast, not gradually. When I moved from Florida to Ohio, there were many factors that led to change.  My next oldest brother and longest friend graduated from High School and went on to BYU.  Also my first girlfriend whom I dated for two years moved to a different state with her family just a few months before we moved to Ohio.  I had a lot of fun with my parents, but I don't think I was ever the same in my high school years.  They were my friends, but they were my parents. By this point, I had already become quite pessimistic about my social situation.  I knew that in no time I was going to have to go to college and leave everyone I knew behind once again.  I was tired of making and breaking these ties so I didn't really try to connect with anyone at school or at church.  I felt forced to spend more time by myself in learning and developing my skills.  During this time I had some good friends that I'll always remember, but I kept myself emotionally detached from everyone I knew. This has become something I still grapple with.  I attended college half time with high school and delved into programming. My skill allowed me to open a personal business so my time was definitely not wasted.

 

I did very well academically so I had my choice among many universities.  I decided to go to Brigham Young University because my brothers had all attended, and I believed it would provide the best environment for learning, strengthening my testimony, and finding my "eternal companion."  Once I graduated from high school, I made the big leap into the heart of LDS country.

Pre-Mission BYU

I had a great experience during my first year at BYU.  I stayed on-campus in Heritage Halls and roomed with my next oldest brother and one of my cousins.  One interesting thing about BYU is that you are required to take eight religion classes as part of your general education requirements (GEs) and attend institute once a week during semesters when you aren't taking a religion class.  I took both Book of Mormon classes in order to get them out of the way.  I learned a lot that I had not known before through those classes.  Many of the professors tell you interesting things that point to the Book of Mormon being true such as artifacts found in South America and possible routes of travel from Jerusalem to the American continents.  Although the stories were very interesting, I always felt like the facts provided were very selectively framed and lacked hard evidence.  My testimony was always based on spiritual things not historical information that I felt was overly hyped and misleading much of the time.  The "facts" provided in these classes were not indisputable, unlike the historical facts I discovered concerning the church after my mission.

 

The on-campus ward was highly intertwined.  I didn't really care for the ward; it was mostly freshman who were, in my opinion, pretty childish.  I didn't care for the LDS social culture before attending BYU so it wasn't a big surprise.  That culture was magnified at BYU, providing for an exhausting atmosphere to live in.  I did attend family home evening (FHE) mostly because my brother and cousin went.  I have never liked being forced into social situations.  I felt like FHE had no real purpose.  If I really wanted to have fun I could just hang out with friends whom I actually cared about.  Like moving around so often while growing up, the FHE members whom I knew I would most likely never see again would just be individuals I was thrown together with for a short period of time. Once I moved off campus after two semesters the atmosphere did start to become watered down, and it was much more bearable.

 

One very important part about BYU that you need to understand is that pre-mission guys and returned missionaries (RMs) are totally different on the social ladder.  If you date a pre-missionary then you know that it probably won't work out so you just have some fun.  Girls consider dating "premes" (short for pre-missionaries) very safe, because it's easy to ditch them once they leave on a mission.  If you want to pursue commitment and get married, then you date an RM.  This does put pressure on guys to go on missions, because if you don't then you are much less likely to get married to someone who is "worthy."  Sadly, many pre-missionaries go on missions expecting their girlfriends to wait for them.  Time and time again, missionaries get a "dear John" letter once their girlfriends get the nerve to write a letter (usually not until long after they hook up with another guy).  There was one girl in my FHE group who told her boyfriend that she would wait even though she dated someone very shortly after he left on his mission.  I have also heard story upon story from friends along the same lines and even personally knew people it happened to while I was on my mission.  Many girls feel pressured to tell their boyfriend they will wait so that they don't hurt their boyfriend's feelings before he leaves.  After all, isn't it much easier to say that in a letter when they are far away?  I was fortunate enough to go on a mission without any "baggage" left back home; I knew the system and how it worked after seeing and hearing about so many guys' hearts broken so I made it a goal to stay single before my mission.

 

One very hard decision I had to make was whether to go on a mission or not.  Although no one knew it, I was wrestling very hard in my mind as to whether I would go or not.  It was not a question of whether or not the church was true, just concern that two years was a long time to leave everything behind.  There was actually a period of time when I had decided that I wouldn't go.  After some thinking, I decided that I probably should go for many reasons.  Yes, like so many others I was worried about having the stigmatism of not having gone on a mission and being looked down upon by the LDS community.  I also wanted to go outside of the country to have an adventurous experience since I had been so many places inside the states.  Looking back, I'm very glad that I decided to go.  It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience that I'll always cherish.  I probably wouldn't be where I am now if I hadn't gone on a mission.  I didn't lose my testimony on my mission, but I did gain enough knowledge to make me curious enough to investigate many of the claims made by those outside of the church.  For better or for worse, I probably would have graduated from BYU and stayed true to the gospel if I had not gone on my mission.

Preparing for the Mission

I moved home to prepare my papers and leave for my mission.  Since my parents had moved to a different state once again, I felt distant from the bishop and from the rest of the people in the ward.  Once you receive your mission call you can receive your endowment, which is a sacred ceremony that takes place in LDS temples.  I wanted to receive my endowment as fast as possible so that I could attend my brother's wedding.   No one (parent, sibling, or otherwise) is allowed into the wedding ceremony without receiving his or her endowment.  This can be a sore subject for parents who are not allowed to take any part in this marriage ceremony.  They are not able to enter the temple if they are non-members or members without a current temple recommend.  I wasn't able to take part in or attend the wedding of another brother of mine because I was too young to have received my endowment.  Thankfully I was able to receive my endowment in time for my other brother's marriage.  I decided to investigate the endowment before I received it.  Members are not supposed to talk about what specifically goes on in the endowment outside of the temple, so I had to go to sources outside of the church.

 

When I received my endowment, my father came as my guide through the temple.  One of the three members of the Temple Presidency told me that I needed to wear the garments (sacred undergarments all endowed members must wear) for protection.  He told me a story about how the garments have protected people physically.  I, of course, refused to believe it and disregarded it as an old wives tale.  My father said that the garments offered a spiritual protection rather than physical protection to the individual by reminding him of covenants made in the temple.  There are many stories of physical protection like this that are told around the church.  The funny thing is that many members of the church believe stories like that are true while believing similar stories from other religions are obviously made-up stories.  The endowment ceremony is a very sacred matter to members of the church so I would like to approach this matter with carefulness.  In the next two paragraphs, I'll explain some things I have found out about the endowment's connection to Masonry and changes made over time by the church to remove disturbing sections from the ceremony.  If you don't feel comfortable reading it, just skip over the red text to the next section.

Connections of the LDS Endowment to the Masonic Ceremony

Discovering the link between the Mormon endowment and the Masonic ceremonies was really the first encounter I had with facts about the church that they won't talk about.  I won't explain all of the details, but basically Joseph Smith joined the Masons after founding the LDS Church and copied their secret ceremony and used it in the church.  The apparent reasoning behind adding the endowment was to give members more power and responsibility while soliciting more loyalty.  Many high members of the early church had become high level Masons and appreciated the power it seemed to give its members.  This information didn't weaken my testimony before my mission.  I simply told myself that whatever the reason was, it was justified because a prophet did it.

 

For more information on the links between the LDS Church and Masons, please see:
http://www.mormonthink.com/templeweb.htm#masonryelements

Changes to the Endowment

I didn't learn these next facts until after my mission or else I might not have gone, but I want to include them here rather than splitting up the topic.  Another disturbing part of the endowment is the changes that were made in order to water down the ceremony.  Today, members are fully clothed in all ordinances (changed in 2005) and don't see a Christian priest preach a false gospel for money from the devil (removed in 1990).  They also no longer take an oath to avenge the blood of Joseph Smith on the nation of the United States (removed in 1927).  Lastly, they no longer symbolically promise to have their own life violently taken rather than tell anyone outside about the ceremony (gradually removed by 1990).  There are many other less visual, but important, changes that have been made to the endowment.

 

For more information about changes in the endowment, see: http://www.utlm.org/newsletters/no104.htm

 

For information regarding the temple in general, please see: http://www.mormonthink.com/templeweb.htm

Missionary Training Center

I entered the Missionary Training Center (MTC) in October 2005.  I set a lot of personal goals to improve myself during my two-year mission.  I knew that in order for my mission to be a success to myself, I would need to accomplish more than just spiritual goals.  Before my mission I was a very picky eater and had various other things I wanted to fix.  Needless to say, I achieved all the goals I set out for myself during my mission, and I believe that I'm a better person now for it.  The MTC is a place where new missionaries learn the official doctrines of the church so that they can be more efficient in converting people.  For many, this is the first time they really learn what the church believes.  Like everything else in the Church Educational System, much of the dark history of the church is completely left out and wrong assumptions are made.  Anyone going to an English-speaking mission stays in the MTC for only two weeks; Spanish speakers stay six weeks; the hardest languages (including mine, Korean) have to stay for twelve weeks.  During that time, you spend all day just studying the gospel, learning your language, and going to large group meetings.

Absolute Control

Probably the most disturbing part of the MTC and mission work in general is that missionaries are completely cut off from the outside world.  They can read only church-approved material (which doesn't even include all church-published material) meaning they cannot keep up with current news or check facts.  They are not allowed to watch television or listen to popular music of any kind for the entire two years.  Missionaries are also not allowed to communicate by phone to anyone outside of their assigned area (usually a city), except on Christmas and Mother's Day, when they are allowed one phone call to their immediate family only.  The missionaries must use church-provided email for the entire mission and are only allowed to use the Internet for email once a week for up to an hour.  Missionaries are encouraged to always use positive language in their emails with family and to not create any worries.  In addition to this extreme control of information, families cannot see the missionaries anytime during the entire mission for any reason whatsoever.  The church says they have these rules so that missionaries can completely focus on learning and preaching the gospel.

 

Missionaries are assigned partners who they must always be with day and night.  According to missionary rules they must always be in eyesight or at the very least hearing distance from their assigned companion.  One of the only times they are not required to be in eyesight of each other is when one is in a restroom stall (though some jokingly question if they need to be in there).  This creates an environment of checks and balances between missionaries so that they are discouraged from breaking mission rules like reading unauthorized material.  Missionaries are encouraged to assist their companions in keeping rules and to report any infractions to their church leaders.  The mission rules and companion system together create an environment of absolute control of information and behavior.

Bible Stories

Being restricted to reading only church-approved material, I delved into the Bible.  Some of the many stories I found over the years that either were out of place or showed a side of God that I would describe as questionable are: killing all life on the face of the earth except for eight individuals and at least two of every kind of animal after God decided all mankind was evil (Genesis 6:5-7, 7:2-4), killing the first-born of every Egyptian family in order to make a point to the pharaoh (Exodus 12:29), killing an individual for touching the Ark of the Covenant to stabilize it (1 Chronicles 13:9-10), punishing Israel because King David decided to count the people (I Chronicles 21), a prophet proving to Israel that Baal was fake whereas his God was real after which the priests of Baal were slaughtered by the prophet (1 Kings 18:21-40), killing of entire towns including woman and children (I Samuel 15:2-3, Isaiah 13:1-18, Deuteronomy 2:33-34, Deuteronomy 3:6, Ezekiel 9:4-7), a bald prophet cursing kids who called him baldhead after which bears came out and attacked 42 children (2 Kings 2:23-24), and the general story of the origin of life on this earth written before we found out that dinosaurs lived and died for apparently no reason whatsoever.

 

Looking back at the Bible after my mission, I have generally felt that Jesus Christ was not the savior prophesied about in the Old Testament.  He fulfilled many prophecies, but how many of them were easily fulfilled by anyone who could read the prophecies?  One prophecy that never seemed to be fulfilled was that Jesus Christ was not called "Emmanuel" (Matthew 1:22-23) by anyone according to the Bible or any other source we have available.  Where are the miracles today like those performed by Jesus Christ or His apostles? They constantly performed miracles and said those who followed would also do them.  There is no modern account I would consider a reliable and unbiased source that shows any miracles have ever happened or are now happening like those performed in the New Testament.

 

Missionaries are trained to use the Bible in order to prove that the LDS Church is true and that other churches are not the same church founded by Jesus Christ.  Although the church does not officially condone it, most missionaries love to take part in "Bible bashing" which involves proving to other Christians that the LDS Church is true through sharing scriptures that support their claims while being prepared for counter-arguments with more scriptures.  There are many interpretations of the same scriptures by different groups, which usually just means that Bible bashing gets nowhere since anyone can interpret any passage differently than what the other person is thinking.  I have found examples given by many churches, including the LDS Church, which are quoted out of context and don't seem like they were intended to be used the way they are used now.

Korean

I would say one of the things that helped me through the MTC and throughout my whole mission was my personal vigor in studying Korean.  I was known both in the MTC and in the field as a dedicated studier.  Studying Korean gave me goals that I could set and reach which would provide unique and useful skills after my mission regardless of church membership.  This dedication led to a deep love of the Korean people and culture that I have enjoyed ever since.  Like studying and progressing on my own during high school, Korean served as an escape for me during this period.

Sin and Control

Missionaries are required to repent entirely of any major sins before entering the mission field.  Many are given a particular book, The Miracle of Forgiveness by Spencer W.  Kimball, which apparently makes anyone who reads it feel very sinful and gives him or her a need to repent of every little thing.  I never had to read it, thank goodness.  There was one particular missionary I knew who had committed a serious sin before entering the MTC.  Not having confessed his sins to any church authorities, he felt pressured and decided to describe his sin to the church leaders at the MTC.  Another noteworthy difference between the LDS Church and other Christian churches is that anything confessed to a LDS Church leader is not kept secret.  The confession was quickly sent up the line to higher authorities.  He went through a very hard time after that, fearing being sent home.  They even contacted the girl to see if the situation had been resolved.  Being sent home is just about the worst thing that can happen to a missionary, even worse than not going on a mission.  People will always assume that you are not a good person if they hear that you were sent home.  It can be like a brand in the middle of a person's forehead and may be a devastating mental scar for life.  Many dishonorably released missionaries become highly depressed.  Sadly, some decide to commit suicide rather than live with such disgrace.  Eventually, this particular missionary was told he would be allowed to stay.  I have never felt the need to go to a church leader with my sins.  In retrospect that was a good decision seeing how leaders of the church don't respect confidentiality.  I have always dealt with my problems personally.  Fear, regarding sin or being sent home or any other such thing, is a major method of control used by the church.

Testifying

We constantly taught lessons about the Bible, Book of Mormon, Jesus Christ, etc. to each other and to volunteer member-investigators.  It's common practice to bear your testimony during all of this.  This constant teaching and testifying is another method, whether intentional or not, of controlling missionaries.  If individuals already believed in the church, then they simply had many opportunities to cement their beliefs.  If they didn't believe it, they had plenty of time to convince themselves that they did.  The MTC contained many of the same controlling techniques that "Especially for Youth" (EFY) did.

 

At the MTC, missionaries were put in situations where they had to decide for themselves whether they believed in the church or not, rather than relying on their parents' testimonies.  Although the choice was given to them, the decision to not believe was a much harder path to walk than the path to believe.  If they decided not to believe, they would be ridiculed by being sent home, and their families and friends might shun them.  Many members of the church say that those who don't believe in the church take the easy way out; I believe that it's the exact opposite.  It's much easier for missionaries to convince themselves that they believe the church is true, serve two years, get married in the temple, etc. rather than face disgrace and disappointment.  I don't want to imply that all those who make that decision do it because it's easier.  Many have made the decision to stay because that is what they genuinely feel.  Nevertheless, there is a large group of individuals who take the easy, more often trodden road of staying Mormon.  There is a poem that President Hinckley often quoted that comes to mind when I think about the decision of leaving the church:

 

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
(The Poetry of Robert Frost, ed.  Edward Connery Lathem, p. 105)

My Mission in Vancouver, Canada

I flew out to Vancouver, Canada in January 2006.  I was introduced to a very different mission environment than I had imagined.  I always envisioned all of the missionaries being totally obedient and dedicating all of their energy to service.  In contrast with my expectations, the missionaries regularly broke mission rules despite dedicating their time to God.  My mission president was very lenient on these missionaries.  His main goal seemed to be not to send a missionary home for any reason.  He simply reassigned disobedient missionaries to different areas leading to more of the same activities.  Their lack of respect for him and their lack of respect for the work had a great impact on me.  Looking at missionary work from the inside provided a much different view than the church had given me.

Contention

I was also surprised by the contention between the missionaries.  I had always envisioned two missionaries serving together in total unity to bring people to Christ, but contention got in the way a surprisingly large amount of the time.  Missionaries seemed to fall into one of two groups: those who wanted to follow all of the rules (and add their own), or those who were up for anything.  Sometimes a companionship would be created with someone from each group. Sometimes, it would turn into a six-week tug of war (the length of time between transfers).  If things turned ugly fast enough, the two missionaries would be transferred away from each other in the middle of a transfer cycle (called an emergency transfer).  Once, I was taken out of a companionship and placed with a different companion, because he and his companion couldn't get along due to major issues.  The original companionship lasted only two weeks making it one of the quickest emergency transfers.

 

While I have now left the church, I don't look back on my mission with regret.  I loved the two years I spent studying religion, learning Korean, and teaching the Korean people.  I experienced a lot of joy as a missionary by helping people directly with problems they were having.  I also had a lot of pain, struggling with companions who had different goals and aspirations than I had.  Every missionary had a different interpretation of what was allowed and what wasn't. This was the most common cause of arguments.  Some missionaries believed in the letter of the law, like getting back to the apartment by 8:30 no matter what. Others believed in the spirit of the law, like arriving home later in order to help someone with a problem.  There was even a mission psychiatrist who met with missionaries having problems.  One of my personal goals was to get along with all of my companions, which I believe I generally succeeded in doing.  I understood how important it was to get along with my companion if I wanted to be happy and also efficient as a missionary.  This led to much give and take, allowing me to learn many skills that will be useful to me after I'm married.  I also went through a lot of positive and negative experiences that built leadership, social, and teaching skills.

 

This story is not meant to be a summary of every experience that I have gone through.  In the next section I'll specifically focus on experiences and things I learned on my mission that have contributed heavily to my decision to leave the church.  I felt that missionaries had to know the position of the church on all items so I was never hesitant about delving deeper into church doctrine or history.  Although we learned a lot in the MTC, there were a lot of questions that investigators asked which were not covered in the lessons.  Sadly, most if not all missionaries teach false doctrines that they believe are doctrine, or they teach incorrect church history.  Not being able to read unapproved material limits the missionaries' ability to gain the true answers to many questions.  After investigators or converts learn the truth, this commonly leads to confusion and a feeling of being lied to, even though the missionaries may not have intended to lie.  I don't believe that most missionaries tell false information on purpose, but most either explain facts they haven't studied in enough depth or explain them in a way which tip toes around the main issue.  This was a major reason why my father began to ask questions about the founding of the church.  Missionaries taught him that Joseph Smith didn't participate in polygamy, citing Joseph's May 1844 speech where he denied ever having more than one wife (History of the Church Volume VI, page 411).  The Church's official Joseph Smith website (josephsmith.net) still lists Emma as his only wife, whereas the facts now speak for themselves (see the section on polygamy after the mission).

Joseph Smith

Multiple First Vision Accounts

As a missionary, I was expected to memorize the official version of the "First Vision" as described by Joseph Smith in 1838.  We constantly practiced how to recite the First Vision in a slow manner in order to convey its importance.  It's actually included as official cannon in the LDS scriptures as part of the Pearl of Great Price.  Most members of the church don't realize that the account found in the scriptures is one of many very different versions written at different times.  They also don't know that there's no record of Joseph Smith publishing the First Vision account until 1842, 22 years after the event is said to have occurred.  During those 22 years many church materials, including a history of the church, were published and distributed.  None mentioned anything regarding the First Vision.  Since the First Vision is now seen as a pivotal moment in church history, why would such an important event be left out of the picture for so long?

 

Depending on which version you read, Joseph Smith either saw an angel, God, Jesus Christ, or a combination of them.  There are other discrepancies among the stories such as: whether he already believed that there was no true church on the earth or if he was asking God which church was true, what age he was at the time, what events led him to pray, etc.  There are even conflicting versions found in the diary of Joseph Smith and in the writings of Oliver Cowdery.  Today the emphasis is placed on the fact that he saw God and Jesus Christ together, thus proving them to be separate individuals with bodies of flesh and bone.  If it was so important to delineate that God and Jesus were separate beings, why did Joseph Smith fail to mention such important points in the different versions of his account?

 

Here are some sources of investigation:
http://www.mormonthink.com/firstvisionweb.htm
http://www.irr.org/mit/first-vision.html
http://www.i4m.com/think/lists/mormon_questions.htm

Translation of the Book of Mormon

Along the same lines as the first vision accounts, the account of how Joseph Smith translated the golden plates has been changed and manipulated over a long period of time.  Official church material today describes Joseph either reading directly from the plates or using a special device called the "Urim and Thummim."  Virtually every eyewitness account available today says that he did neither of those.  According to eyewitnesses Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Emma Smith, he used a seer stone that he put in a hat and looked into it to translate the plates.  The church still has the stone, despite not referencing it at all in relation to its use in translation.  Joseph apparently didn't even need to use the plates at all, often keeping them in another location while he translated.  The seer stone was only one object that Joseph used.  He was also a believer in magic objects until his death, a fact not mentioned by the church.

 

I first learned about this on the PBS documentary about the church called "The Mormons".  While I was on my mission, I watched it with a member who invited us to watch it with him.  I had heard that it was a very objective documentary, which is fairly rare, so I was very interested in watching it.  Other available productions, like "The Godmakers" are generally filled with lies and exaggerations that even critics of the church recognize as ridiculous.  It was in "The Mormons" that I learned that Joseph Smith really translated the plates with the same seer stone that he had used while hunting for treasure.  He was even convicted in a court and found guilty of treasure hunting before finding the golden plates.  You can watch the entire PBS documentary online for free at: http://www.pbs.org/mormons/view/

 

Ever since learning the truth about how Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon, I was extremely disappointed in the fact that the Church never discusses it in any meaningful way.  Even the most recent official church movie titled "Joseph Smith" continues the facade that Joseph Smith read from the gold plates.  Surely the church leaders would correct the director to portray a more historically accurate video right?  Nope.  For a church that puts so much pride in correctness they sure seem to be dropping the ball on inconvenient truths.

 

For more information on the translating process of the Book of Mormon, see:
http://www.mormonthink.com/transbomweb.htm
http://www.irr.org/mit/first-vision/fvision-accounts.html
http://www.irr.org/mit/divination.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/video/flv/generic.html?s=frol02s761q114
http://www.mrm.org/translation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_plates#Translating_the_plates

Blacks and the Priesthood

Blacks all around the world were not allowed to receive the priesthood, the power of God, until 1978, when the church leaders finally received a revelation that all worthy males should be able to receive it.  There are many theories as to why the church held this position.  Most people either attribute it to "God does things in his own time" or "the world wasn't ready for blacks receiving the priesthood."  I don't accept either.  Through my study of church leaders, it seems that African Americans were discriminated against early in the church.  One of the many examples is when Joseph Smith, the founder of the church, fined two black men $25 for trying to marry white women (Origins of Power, Quinn, p. 642).  There were harsher punishments given out elsewhere by other people, but does that really matter?  Bruce McConkie, a modern apostle, once said about those who are born with black skin:

 

"As a result of his rebellion, Cain was cursed with a dark skin; he became the father of the Negroes, and those spirits who are not worthy to receive the priesthood are born through his lineage." Mormon Doctrine, pp. 108-109, 1966 edition (NOTE: The church does not endorse this book, but nevertheless it was written by a general authority)

 

One of the twelve apostles, Delbert Stapley, even sent a letter in 1963 to then governor George Romney telling him to not continue fighting for civil rights.  In the letter, Elder Stapley references page 269 of the Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pages 436 and 440 of the History of the Church Period 1, Volume 2, and the church pamphlet Mormonism and the Negro.

As the church grew around the world it started to run into a problem: many males could not receive the priesthood, which limited the growth of the church.  Although the church's stance changed later, I feel that the church changed positions because it was convenient according to the times rather than being decreed by God.  The church was under high pressure, including a boycott of BYU sports, to reverse its racial discrimination at the time when this revelation was received.

 

For more information on the subject, please see:
http://www.mormonthink.com/blackweb.htm
http://www.boston.com/news/daily/24/delbert_stapley.pdf

Interesting Encounters

Vancouver was an interesting place to meet people.  I don't know how I did it, but I seemed to attract all the weirdos from as far as the eye can see.  Multiple drugged-up people screaming curse words or talking nonsensically, one man telling me he could prove himself as a prophet because there would be lights under my bed that night, a group of Christians who told me they could see devils (literally, as they were talking with us), and a lady screaming at us that Mormons are going to hell are just a few examples of some of the more "interesting" encounters I've had during my mission.

 

One of the things I liked the most about Vancouver was that it is such a very diverse area.  As a missionary, I spent hours daily talking to random people I met on the trains and streets of Vancouver.  I was able to meet Buddhists, Sikhs, Muslims, Natives, Christians of many different beliefs and faiths, Jews, and more.  Those individuals also had a wide range in personality types and situations; there were prophets, millionaires, junkies, single mothers, homosexuals, born-again Christians, etc.  I loved the opportunity to see how so many different people lived their lives and what they truly believed.  Most of their religious institutions had common characteristics including a creation story, a journey to truth, opposition, cannon, and some kind of hierarchy.  Of course, every institution also includes the same elements of information control and social engineering.  No religious institution can bring me happiness.  There is no purpose in trading a pair of blinders for a pair of handcuffs.

 

In all of my street contacting, I distinctly remember one lady I met while serving in North Vancouver who said something I wouldn't forget.  She said that she thought the Book of Mormon was true but that the Old Testament was unbelievable.  I had already thought that, but I finally heard what I believed from someone else.  I couldn't get what she said out of my mind.  Through all my studying and investigations, I couldn't and cannot accept the Old Testament as scripture.  All of the questionable stories I previously mentioned from the Bible were from the Old Testament.

 

There was one other person who I talked to who made me think a lot.  He was pretty much the opposite of the lady who I agreed with and talked with for what seemed like forever.  While doing street contacting, a man simply told me that he had been there, done that, served the mission, left the church, and didn't really need to talk about it.  That was my first real experience seeing someone who had served a mission and after returning left the church.  Didn't all missionaries know the church was true if they successfully served a two year mission?  It just blew my mind that this person could calmly tell me that he was over everything.

The Car Comment

There was a time when I was in the car with my fellow Korean-speaking missionaries when one of them made a comment I wouldn't forget.  I don't remember what the topic of conversation was, but I distinctly remember him saying, "One in four missionaries leaves the church or becomes less active after going home.  I wonder which of us it will be?"  When I heard that, I just snickered because out of the four of us I was probably considered one of those who would never leave.

Going Home

Before returning home, all missionaries go through an exit interview with the mission president.  It involves discussing the mission and plans for the missionary when he or she returns home.  Many mission presidents, mirroring the counsel of the church leaders, tell returning missionaries to get married as fast as possible and have kids.  I have always hated the advice given by church leaders to get married and have kids as soon as possible after a mission.

 

A very odd practice that my mission president followed was that he would not, even if requested, renew the missionaries' temple recommends.  The church asks all members to carry a current temple recommend, even if there's no temple nearby.  Many missionaries felt bad because our president let our recommends expire.   As with every other missionary, my president finally renewed my temple recommend in my exit interview after I had gone months without a valid temple recommend.  I was one of the first missionaries under a new program of the church that gives time-limited temple recommends to returning missionaries.  Whereas, before, missionaries were treated like regular members and given two-year recommends, now returning missionaries are only given four month recommends.  This is part of a program to ensure that returning missionaries don't fall from the fold as soon as they get home.  I believe that the church has done studies and found that many return missionaries fall away from the church within four months or something like that.  Just like many programs already discussed, this is yet another method of control used by the church to ensure it keeps its members in check.

At Home

I returned home in October 2007 and stayed there until I returned to BYU in January 2008.  Although I had a temple nearby after my mission, I never went back to a temple even once since leaving the MTC.  I didn't receive any joy going through the endowment ceremony, so I was glad that I was never pressured into going back by anyone.  I was encouraged by the stake president to attend the local Young Single Adults (YSA) church meeting rather than attending my parents' ward even though I would only be home for two months.  This is part of the policy of the church to get returned missionaries married as fast as possible.  Some returned missionaries have become engaged after dating for two weeks.

 

During my time at home I did a lot of investigating of the church.  I particularly read the Bible and Doctrine and Covenants every night with my parents.  My father is a lover of history and provided a lot of insight into the history of the church that I had never heard before.  Rough Stone Rolling by Richard L. Bushman, a great historical source of information on Joseph Smith, was a major topic of discussion.  The following are some topics that I had never known about before that I learned after returning home.  The two topics that pushed me over the edge in leaving Mormonism were the Book of Abraham and the lies surrounding Joseph Smith's practice of polygamy.

The Book of Abraham

The Book of Abraham is claimed to be an ancient document written by the hand of Abraham.  During the time of Joseph Smith, no one knew how to translate Egyptian.  Joseph Smith claimed he could translate ancient languages because he was a seer.

 

"On 3 July 1835 a man named Michael Chandler brought four Egyptian mummies and several papyrus scrolls of ancient Egyptian writings to Kirtland, Ohio.  The mummies and papyri had been discovered in Egypt several years earlier by Antonio Lebolo.  Kirtland was one of many stops in the eastern United States for Chandler's mummy exhibition.  Chandler was offering the mummies and rolls of papyrus for sale and, at the urging of the Prophet Joseph Smith, several members of the Church donated money to purchase them.  In a statement dated 5 July 1835, Joseph Smith, declaring the importance of these ancient Egyptian writings, recorded: "I commenced the translation of some of the characters or hieroglyphics, and much to our joy found that one of the rolls contained the writings of Abraham.  .  .  .  Truly we can say, the Lord is beginning to reveal the abundance of peace and truth" (History of the Church, 2:236).

 

The Church Education System (CES) manual on the Pearl of Great tells us:

 

"The Prophet Joseph Smith never communicated his method of translating these records.  As with all other scriptures, a testimony of the truthfulness of these writings is primarily a matter of faith.  The greatest evidence of the truthfulness of The Book of Abraham is not found in an analysis of physical evidence nor historical background, but in prayerful consideration of its content and power."
http://institute.lds.org/manuals/pearl-of-great-price-student-manual/pgp-3-a.asp

 

The heading to The Book of Abraham in the Pearl of Great Price states that the papyrus used by Joseph to translate was written by the hand of Abraham.  The Times and Seasons Vol 3, Number 9 (March 1, 1842) page 704 article "A Translation" added that The Book of Abraham was written by the hand of Abraham.  The Improvement Era magazine Vol XLVIII No. 11, November 1945, Lesson 5 for Melchizedek Priesthood details that Joseph proudly pointed out the signature of Abraham: ‘There', said he, pointing to a particular character,' that is the signature of the patriarch Abraham."

 

Joseph Smith showcased the mummies and papyri for the rest of his life.  Fragments of the scrolls still exist, including the facsimiles where Joseph identified specific symbols and gave their meanings.  Scholars can now translate ancient Egyptian, thanks to the Rosetta stone.  There is no correlation between Joseph's translation and the translation by scholars.  Joseph began to build a dictionary of Egyptian-to-English for use by ordinary people and scholars as a language translation tool.  The symbols translated in this draft dictionary don't correlate to the Egyptian language of old, as understood today.  Many members use the facsimiles, which are printed in the Pearl of Great Price as proof of Joseph Smith's ability as a translator.  The irony of this is that it proves the exact opposite - Joseph's translation of the facsimile symbols doesn't match the known translation.  If Joseph Smith invented scripture from a funeral document from 100 BCE (that is what the papyri actually is), is it likely he did the same for the Book of Mormon and the Doctrine and Covenants?  Joseph quoted Jesus Christ's exact words that he said were spoken to him in revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants, then edited them and changed them in later editions.  These changes were not corrections of typographical errors.  All you have to do is compare the original Book of Commandments with the different editions of the Doctrine and Covenants, including the official editions published in Europe.  The following is a very well made documentary on the Book of Abraham which covers everything I've talked about and much more: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcyzkd_m6KE

 

For more information, please see By His Own Hand Upon Papyri by Charles M. Larson or check out the following websites: http://www.mormonthink.com/boaweb.htm
http://www.irr.org/mit/book-of-abraham-page.html

The Kinderhook Plates

Joseph Smith was presented with plates in 1843 by a group of men who represented them as genuine artifacts. However, they were a hoax. Joseph wrote in his journal "[May 1, 1843:] I insert fac similes of the six brass plates found near Kinderhook, in Pike county, Illinois, on April 23, by Mr. R. Wiley and others, while excavating a large mound. They found a skeleton about six feet from the surface of the earth, which must have stood nine feet high. The plates were found on the breast of the skeleton, and were covered on both sides with ancient characters. "I have translated a portion of them, and find they contain the history of the person with whom they were found. He was a descendant of Ham, through the loins of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and that he received his kingdom from the ruler of heaven and earth."

 

They were never translated, but a plate from the record was found later, identified as one of the plates and was confirmed to be created in the 1800s.  The plates could not have been made in ancient America.  The Church recognizes that they were part of an attempted hoax on Joseph as documented by Stanley B. Kimball, in the article "Kinderhook Plates Brought to Joseph Smith Appear to Be a Nineteenth-Century Hoax," Ensign, Aug 1981, page 66. You may note in the article that the church claims that Joseph did not actually write about the plates in his journal and contends he didn't translate them either.  There is even an illustration in the History of the Church, vol. 5 pages 374 - 75 showing what they looked like.

 

Although the Kinderhook plates are a much smaller subject because they were not actually translated and published as canon like the Book of Abraham, this helps show a pattern of Joseph Smith lying about his abilities to identify ancient documents.

 

For more information, please see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinderhook_plates
http://www.mormonthink.com/kinderhookweb.htm
http://www.mormoninformation.com/kinderhk.htm
http://www.irr.org/mit/kinderhook-plates.html
http://www.mrm.org/kinderhook-plates

Failed Prophecies

Church members claim you can tell a prophet is true if his prophesies come to pass.  They claim that all of Joseph Smith's prophecies were true.  What you won't find in the church teachings are the prophecies that Joseph gave that turned out to be utterly false.  If anyone asks about them, the usual response is either "not all revelation comes from God," "Joseph Smith was also a person and people make mistakes," or "prophecies require the people in them to be worthy."  I don't believe any of these are good enough reasons to explain why prophecies didn't come true.  If it was stated as a prophecy, then it was issued as a prophecy and should come to pass no matter what.

 

There were many prophecies given which didn't come to pass that are still contained in the Doctrine and Covenants.  Joseph Smith prophesied that a temple would be built in Missouri "in this generation" (D&C 84:1-5); that never happened.  He said that there was no other place than Missouri appointed by God for the gathering of the saints (D&C 101:17-20); they were thrown out and eventually gathered to Utah.  The United Order was established as unchangeable and essential (D&C Section 104); it eventually died off after failing.  He prophesied that they would make a trip to Massachusetts and find treasure (remember, he was a treasure hunter) (D&C Section 111); nothing was found.  These are just a few of the many failed prophecies.

 

For more information on failed prophecies, please see:
http://www.mrm.org/civil-war
http://www.irr.org/mit/js-failed-prophecies.html
http://www.exmormon.org/prophet.htm

Post-Mission BYU

I went back to BYU in January 2008.  This time I would have a much different experience.  By this point in my life I had not made a decision about whether or not to leave the church, but I was proactively protecting myself from digging myself deeper into the church.  For fear of getting married to a member of the church, I generally abstained from dating.  I just didn't want to get married to someone who was Mormon and then have a harder time if I decided to leave the church.  There are many examples of families that have been broken up once a member has decided to leave the church.  Along the same lines, I was also afraid to pursue any job where I would work for or with a member for fear of being discriminated against after leaving the church; a fallen member is much worse than a non-member.

 

My first Sunday at church was an interesting one.  I decided to wear a nice green shirt I had been given for Christmas.  After seeing me in my green shirt, the bishop decided to schedule an appointment immediately.  We met and he told me that he expected me to wear a white shirt and look like a missionary from now on.  I was already going to do so, but just the fact that he did that after one Sunday annoyed me a lot.  From that moment on, I always felt like I was under a microscope with him.  I attended Family Home Evening (FHE) only once or twice the entire year and abstained from most other social activities.

Polygamy, Lies and Polyandry

I had already known about the Book of Abraham by the time I went to BYU, but there were many facts I had not known about the extent that Joseph Smith and others went to in order to cover up his practice of polygamy.  Many people hear about the Mormon sects which still practice polygamy today.  Since they are called ‘Mormons' by the news media and the LDS Church is also referred to as the Mormon Church, members have to explain that the LDS Church is not affiliated with polygamous sects that broke off from the church after polygamy was stopped.  It's a very sensitive subject in the church today because of how far the church has distanced itself from the practice in the public eye.  Although the church actively distances itself from those sects, it still believes that polygamy is a true doctrine.  Most members simply accept the fact that polygamy was practiced at one point without investigating into what extent it was practiced and into the facts of early church history.

 

What most people don't know is that Joseph Smith secretly practiced polygamy with at least 33 teenage girls and women, while denying it publicly, and even to his own wife.  He approached married women to become his wives (called Polyandry) even though they were already married.  There's no way to explain away something so despicable.  How would you like it if your wife (or husband) was approached and asked to secretly marry someone, yet at the same time continue living in marriage with you?  While all of this was going on, Joseph and the other leaders of the church had to continuously  publicly lie that Joseph was not practicing polygamy (again, you may reference the official History of the Church).  Joseph went so far as to approve an additional section to be added to the church doctrine (section 101 in the 1835 edition of the Doctrine and Covenants that explicitly stated, "Inasmuch as this Church of Christ has been reproached with the crime of ... polygamy: we declare that we believe that one man should have one wife; and one woman but one husband." (Doctrine and Covenants Section 101, 1835 edition) (NOTE: Oliver Cowdery wrote it, not Joseph Smith, but Joseph approved it.)

 

Joseph had been practicing polygamy since at least 1833, two years prior to this official monogamous doctrine of the church.  After Joseph Smith's death, the church split into multiple groups after a major argument erupted about who should become the next prophet.  One group led by Brigham Young became the main LDS Church you see today.  Another group was called the RLDS or Reorganized Latter-Day Saints Church.  The RLDS Church was organized while Joseph Smith's son, Joseph Smith III, was a still a young boy.  Later after Joseph Smith III reached adulthood, he was asked by the RLDS Church to be their leader.  Joseph Smith's son agreed to lead the RLDS Church.  Emma Smith, Joseph's widow and legal wife, also joined the RLDS Church.  The RLDS Church name was changed just a few years ago and is now the Community of Christ.  Back when the church split at the time of Joseph Smith's death, there were other small groups with their own leaders also claiming to be the original church.

 

While the RLDS Church kept section 101 as official doctrine and banned polygamy. In 1852 Brigham Young published Joseph's revelation commanding the practice of taking plural wives.  He announced that polygamy was to be practiced in the LDS Church even though section 101 was in the 1835 edition of the Doctrine and Covenants.  It wasn't until 1876 that section 101 was removed and replaced by section 132 - the section commanding the practice of taking plural wives.  Eventually, the church caved in and suspended the practice of taking plural wives when they wanted Utah to become a state in America.  Church leaders even hid from the public in order to not be arrested for practicing polygamy once the government stepped in.

 

Although new members of the church today don't practice polygamy, they must accept it as doctrine from God.  If they don't accept polygamy as a church principle, they reject official doctrine of the church given in Doctrine and Covenants section 132.  There was one investigator I heard about who had a hard time accepting polygamy even though she didn't have to practice it.  The missionaries didn't let her get baptized until she accepted it.  What most members don't realize is that at any time the church could reinstate polygamy if it really wanted to do so, providing the law changed allowing polygamy.  As missionaries, we never brought this up with investigators if they didn't specifically ask about it.  Most new members of the church have no idea what the church really believes about polygamy.

 

There are several excellent books that detail Joseph Smith's polygamy as well as polygamy in the LDS Church.  Some that are worthwhile include: In Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith by Todd Compton, Mormon Polygamy: A History by Richard S. Van Wagoner, Mormon Enigma: Emma Hale Smith by Linda Newell & Valeen Avery, and Joseph Smith III: Pragmatic Prophet by Roger D. Launius.  For more information on section 101, please see: http://www.centerplace.org/library/study/dc/ldc-marr.htm

 

Here are some more sources of information:
http://www.mormonthink.com/polyweb.htm
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/video/flv/generic.html?s=frol02s768q114
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/video/flv/generic.html?s=frol02s769q114
http://www.i4m.com/think/polygamy/JS_Polygamy_Timeline.htm

My Father Leaves the Church

I didn't know it, but my father was actually investigating the church for himself while I was doing the same.  He hadn't decided to leave before I went back to BYU, but he was in the process of deciding.  He called me a few weeks later and told me that he had sent in his letter of resignation and had received confirmation of its receipt at Church Headquarters.  This meant that he was no longer a member of the church.  While my brothers were very surprised, I had been with my father long enough to know that he knew enough about the actual history of the church to warrant making that decision.  I myself was in a similar state so I actually felt some joy when I heard about it, though I couldn't express it to anyone, even my father.

 

I have found that members of the church actually thrive on these kinds of events.  There has been a pattern in the church of being strengthened through adversity and trials.  When members find out disturbing truths like those found in this story, they believe they are stronger by knowing these things and not accepting them as true.  Members generally attribute leaving the church to one of only three possibilities: (1) committing serious sin, or (2) not wanting to follow the commandments because they are too tough, or (3) that they have been offended.  My father's decision was based on the lack of Joseph Smith's trustworthiness and nothing else, as was my own.  Joseph made serious false statements in speeches and documents concerning matters of fact about his conduct.  Joseph denied polygamy while practicing it and claimed an angel would slay him if he didn't start practicing polygamy.  He told this to women who were reluctant to yield to his proposals.  There are multiple references to his story of the sword-wielding angel by presidents of the church, Joseph's friends, and some of the women who were involved.  President Joseph F. Smith bore testimony in a talk given at The Tabernacle in Salt Lake City July 7, 1878 of an angel's threat to slay Joseph if he didn't begin the practice of polygamy.  He also stated that Joseph had known about the commandment to practice plural marriage since 1832.  If my father was to believe Joseph's story of the First Vision and Moroni's appearance, he had to believe Joseph's story that God would slay him for not practicing polygamy.  The credibility of the polygamy statements (known falsehoods, illegal secret practice of polygamy, and a tale of a destroying angel) infused the foundational accounts.  The polygamy story was built on falsehood; there was no reason to believe the foundational stories were not also fabricated.  Everything had to stand on its own and be subject to ordinary investigation.

 

Some sources that my father found useful are: (1) "Plural Marriage for the Righteous Only-Obedience Imperative-Blessings Resulting", President Joseph F.  Smith, Journal of Discourses, Vol.  20, pp. 28-29 (2) Sister Mary Lightner's Address to BYU, April 14th, 1905, BYU Archives and Manuscripts, and (3) Doctrines of The Kingdom, Hyrum L.  Andrus, p 489

 

Because of hearing facts that might lead one away from the church, many people adapt by creating excuses.  Others become numb to any information that could be viewed as negative towards the church.  When I heard the decision my father had made in light of the facts, my church-built instincts told me at first that learning such things and not leaving the church would somehow strengthen my testimony and me.  Of course, now I regard those instincts as defensive mechanisms built up by members of the church.

Questions

At the same time when I heard about my father leaving the church, I hadn't made my decision yet so I was left to grapple with eternal questions.  Would we be an eternal family?  Would Heaven be Heaven without my father if he couldn't be there?  What was the church's real position on what would happen to him?  How about my mother? Would she be able to enjoy eternal marriage that is considered the most far-reaching message of the church?  I believe coming to grips with these questions, along with all the information I had gathered in the past, really drove me away from the LDS Church.  I personally believed that my father was worthy of the highest degree of heaven, but the church's stance was that he would not be able to go there to live with God, his wife, or any of his family.  Most members would say only God knows where he would go when they hear something like that, but if you believe in the doctrine and all that's preached by the church you know that he would never be able to enter the place where those people are.  The position of the church is that even people who don't know about the LDS Church, but would have accepted membership in it if they had been given the opportunity, can go to heaven.  The problem is that it does not apply to those who have knowingly rejected the LDS gospel.  My father was a fully temple endowed member of the church who stated that Joseph Smith's trustworthiness was not credible.  Anyone who understands LDS doctrine understands that according to the church, my dad will NOT go to the highest kingdom in heaven where Jesus, The Holy Ghost, and God The Father are. 

Over the Edge

There were a few things that pushed me over the edge after I heard about my father's decision.

The Suggestion

I'll never forget when I was having real depression about being at BYU that my father asked me over the phone if I had ever considered transferring to another university, like the University of Utah.  That gesture stuck on my brain until the minute I made my decision to leave.  I don't know whether he knew that I was having serious doubts about the church or not, but he opened a door I had not even considered yet.  Before that time I hadn't even thought of transferring as a real option, but once I heard it I couldn't get it off of my mind.

The Chad Hardy Story

I found some comfort in reading stories that people posted in sites that support people who leave the church or are investigating leaving.  In browsing through one, PostMormon.org, I came across the story of a BYU student who was being denied his degree.  Chad Hardy earned his degree at BYU and should have been awarded his degree.  Because of being excommunicated after finishing classes, but before receiving his degree, BYU denied presenting him with his diploma without calling him to council (a BYU policy) or questioning the reasons for excommunication.  He appealed the case to BYU. The appeal was denied since BYU doesn't interfere in or question ecclesiastical actions.  A story like this is not very good press for the church.  For a church that prides itself in making people better, they didn't seem to blink when they denied Chad his degree.  That was it.  I decided to leave BYU.  I could not stay in an institution I didn't respect.  After all, the University of Utah offered a better study abroad program for me and had a more acclaimed engineering department.

The Honor Code and Ecclesiastical Endorsement

After hearing about Chad's experience, I decided to look into the BYU honor code that all BYU students must abide by or they could be kicked out of school.  Since BYU accepts non-members, surely I wouldn't encounter a problem if I simply chose to be a non-member, right?  I found the clause that says, "Excommunication, disfellowshipment, or disaffiliation from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints results in the withdrawal of the student's endorsement" (BYU Ecclesiastical Endorsement).  Wait, so even if I decided to peacefully leave the church, BYU would kick me out?  That was the final straw-I was done.  I had already decided to leave BYU, but now they were controlling my ability to leave the church without being kicked out of school?  I was totally fed up with the school and church that didn't allow me to make a free choice of religion.  I had enough facts piled up that I finally felt confident in my decision to leave BYU and the church behind.

 

Another policy included in the honor code states that students "promoting homosexual relations as being morally acceptable" can be "separated from the university" (Clarifications of the Honor Code, Homosexuality Behavior or Advocacy).  Proposition 8, a ban on same-sex marriage in California, was a major subject in the church.  The church spent a lot of money and had members spend countless hours calling California residents to promote the proposition that eventually passed.  That means that BYU wouldn't allow students to speak up and voice their opinion if they felt that same-sex couples should receive the same rights as traditional couples.  I have always felt that people should be able to at least talk and argue their points without fear of repercussions.  I personally feel that people should be able to marry whoever they want and don't really get why someone like the LDS Church needs to impose their beliefs on other people.

Now What?

Now that I had decided to leave the church, I was left with another question: now what?  Many members who leave the church must face this same question.  What would they believe?  Although many wrestle with the question, I didn't really need to.  I had the answer in me all along: I'm atheist.  Although I had faith growing up, I never felt I truly knew who God was.  Looking back at all my prayers, I can't point to one experience that proved God was really listening.  Along the same lines, I couldn't prove to myself that I had actually felt the Holy Ghost at any point in my life.  I had not had some special spiritual experience like a vision and no one else really had any provable evidence either.  I decided I had the same amount of evidence that there is no god, as any religious person has to prove that there is one.  Therefore I classify myself as an atheist.  At first I thought that I would describe myself as agnostic, but agnostics say that they don't know if there's a god or not; I believe that there is no god.  That's where the difference lies.  I cannot consider the Bible as evidence or believe what other people say about a god I truly know nothing about.  I can't assume God could hear me if I pray, so I don't. I can't assume other people have a full knowledge of anything; humans far too often deceive themselves. I can't rely on my own feelings, because people's feelings often deceive them.  I believe that religions throughout time have been crafted to fill the needs that people have, whether they need to be a part of a bigger plan, feel relief from the bad things people do, or answer questions that are unanswerable.  Religion gives people these answers.  Far too often I hear people saying they ‘need religion' and therefore join a church.  Why does a need, whether real or not, help prove something is true or not?  Should I go to a church just to help my kids have values?  That is something I can't understand and cannot do.  I won't prostitute my beliefs for my needs or wants.  I don't think religion is inherently bad, but I do think the logic used to justify it is inherently flawed.

The Decision

I finally did it.  I called my parents in late October 2008 and told them that I had made my decision to leave BYU and the church.  Although it was hard and nerve wracking to pick up the phone and make the call, I was not so nervous about telling them I was leaving the church.  After all, my father left and my mother understood where he was coming from so I knew that they would both understand me.  After talking for a while, my parents asked me what I did believe in and what my testimony was now.  It took a second for me to gather myself and build up the courage to explain my decision to leave religion.  I knew that both of my parents were very religious and have always relied heavily on God.  After a pause I told them that I didn't believe in Jesus Christ or God anymore.

 

This was the first time in my life, I verbally explained to anyone about my true feelings.  I explained that I saw a strong parallel between Mormonism and Christianity.  While they are very different in many ways, it's hard not to notice the same techniques used in both to control information, build membership, etc.  Millions today believe Joseph Smith was really a prophet and that he did everything they think he did.  He lived just 200 years ago, and many of the facts are already skewed as I have explained throughout this story.  How can I believe what people say about another religious leader who lived 2,000 ago?  It's hard especially given that the Roman Empire officially accepted Christianity and had full control over it.  After over a thousand years of absolute control, individuals continuously molded new churches based on what they believed the original looked like without any idea what the original really was.  There are a lot of points I could touch on about Christianity that I won't go into, since my core belief is that God doesn't exist.  Anything else is irrelevant.

Pre-departure

I planned on transferring to the University of Utah in January 2009, but I had to defer that until the summer because I was not able to get residency yet.  I would have to grapple with staying at BYU for half-a-year before I would be allowed to officially leave the church.  Once I found that out, I decided to move to another apartment even if it was just for one semester in order to get out of my ward.  I moved a little further away from campus.  I enjoyed the new apartment a lot more since I had a private room, and the ward and bishop were a lot more distant.  That was a welcome change from the previous ward.

 

Over the next few months I was in constant communication with my parents.  They continuously gave me information regarding Jesus Christ and had me read More Than a Carpenter by Josh McDowell.  It was an interesting book and I had many wonderful conversations with them, but I never found anything that convinced me that God exists or that Jesus Christ was my savior.  My father and mother wrote me often and included an incredible amount of personal writing for me that gave their understanding of Jesus and the Bible.  They talked with me many times during each week, telling me about Jesus and making sure I was okay.  I didn't believe any of their evidence, but I did know that they loved me as me, however I am, and not because I followed a certain path.  If there's anything I'm sure of, it's that I have unconditional love from my parents.

Losing God

Members of religion might call me a sign watcher, but is that really very much to ask for?  Outside of the subject of "God" most people ask for proof whether something really exists or not, and that proof can be given even if it would take a great effort to provide it.  They want to be able to see reality with their own eyes.  Unless I have a personal experience like the apostle Paul, I won't be able to be convinced that God's existence is any more real than Santa's.  Since I don't believe in God or any other deity, I don't believe that I need to ask Him in prayer or read scriptures in order to find out if He's there or not.  I have done enough of that in my life up until now and have never received a confirmation.  If He does exist, I'll find out through living my daily life.

Leaving

                After I finally moved up to Salt Lake City and once I was sure my BYU record would be safe, I decided to send in my letter of resignation.  Unlike the way most churches handle members leaving, you have to actually formally ask for your name to be removed from the records of the LDS Church.  According to law, members of an organization have the right to resign by simply notifying the organization with a letter that states that they resign their membership. People don't need permission to resign, nor do they have to accept a waiting period.  A resignation letter is effective upon receipt by the organization. The LDS Church however does not abide by the law when it comes to letting members go.  While I understand that they do everything with my well-being in mind, I had hoped that they would respect the law and my request.

 

I called all of my family and messaged my friends and previous mission companions to let them know that I had turned in my letter of resignation.  Those who didn't know about my situation were shocked, but like my family they were accepting of my decision and expressed their love for me.  When I look back in many years, I believe that I'll remember the love I received more than anything else.  I appreciate the good family and friends that I have.  Compared to many others, my exit from the church was without any bumps.

 

Over the next month I started school at the University of Utah and began adjusting to my new life.  I used my extra time and energies to take hikes and attend local events, gain new hobbies like photography, ponder life, etc.  The church gives people a 30-day period after they turn in their letter to let them take the letter back if they decide they were wrong.  As time goes on and on, I have felt more and more comfortable in the position I have taken and the direction my life is heading.  I finally received a confirmation from my local Stake President whom I never met. He stated that he was going to send the letter to the church headquarters to have my name removed in a couple of days. I received my letter from the church a week later.

Freedom

Now I end with my favorite scripture that applies to me now more than ever:

 

"And oh, what joy, and what marvelous light I did behold; yea, my soul was filled with joy as exceeding as was my pain!  Yea, ... there could be nothing so exquisite and so bitter as were my pains.  Yea, ...  on the other hand, there can be nothing so exquisite and sweet as was my joy." (Alma 36:20-21, Book of Mormon)

 

For more general information about the church, please see:
http://www.mormonthink.com/
http://www.mrm.org/
http://packham.n4m.org/tract.htm

 

For more stories like mine, please visit:

http://www.postmormon.org/exp_e/index.php/pomopedia/Personal_Accounts_of_Leaving_Mormonism
http://www.irr.org/mit/stories.html
http://www.exmormon.org/stories.htm