I didn't know what answers to expect when I originally started this thread.
I guess I shouldn't have been surprised to see so many posters say
it was the temple that opened their eyes to TSCC being a cult.

I guess the temple ceremony is going to require a lot more changes,
than TSCC has already made, to make it even more "User Friendly."

Too many to mention, but on the list:

a) Masonic origins of the temple, and masonic symbols on garmies, and being instructed to put faith in them, instead of faith focused on God first.
b) Prophets that don't prophesies.
c) Endless meetings and chatter which seemed to be modeled more after the Pharisees then the Lord. Love of talking about people, more then the people themselves.
d) Excessive use of ridicules titles, whereas the Lord put no value in titles (e.g. brining forth the Child as an example of good, the widow and her mite, the good samaritan)
e) The corporate structure, and local structures that encouraged boasting from the pulpit, and lying to keep your status.
f) The requirement for inner lying to myself for Mormonism to be acceptable.
g) Going home with a headache every Sunday after 5 or more hours of meetings, not feeling enriched, and having to take a long nap to sleep it off. When I left the church, the headaches went away.
h) Low character of Joseph Smith.
i) Going to the last Stake conference I ever attended, and reaching my hand out, with a smile, to shake the hand of the regional authority, only to have a cold cynical expression looking back at me.
j) The realization of the changes in the church over time. The one true church would be inspired from the beginning and wouldn't need to change.
k) The plagiarism of the Bible in the Book of Mormon.
l) Book of Abraham.

The above list only scratches the surface.

...when some old guy I didn't know was holding my head under water.

You're not joking. It really is 'the emporors no clothes' moment.

Or is 'it's a cult' the further light and knowledge' God wants to bestow on us?

It struck me today, out of nowwhere:

10 million resigned and/or inactive

15 men sitting in Salt Lake City

Those are the odds.

10 million to 15 PAID management think its a fraud.

Sort of makes me think - at what point are those 15 going to stop and realise that (if they believe that is) 10 MILLION people examine the LDS church and come to the same conlusion (scam) compared to their 15 men.

If they're sitting in meetings with Jesus every week, now is the time to come out and tell everyone!

I'm sure it's a "trade secret" of LD$ Inc, but are there any statistics, anywhere, what is the number of active members worldwide? Or, the number of active tithe payers?

Yes, you could call it a "trade secret." The 5 million active worldwide is an educated guess, based in part on census data of people's self-identified religious affiliation. Usually--especially outside the U.S.--you have TSCC reporting like four or five times the number of members in a given country as self-identify as Mormon in the national census. So, it's a good guess.

So, 2/3 of the "Customers" who "bought" the product do not use it anymore. I wonder how many prospective customers, give TSCC a good look (after receiving the sales pitch or doing a little comparison shopping of their own) and decide they are uninterested in closing the deal? There must be tens of millions of people who realize the product is inferior and expensive--I'm sure these vastly exceed the number of current, inactive, or former Mormons.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2014 11:35PM by stillburned.

People were lined up two places one into the stake center
One into the temple; my cousin came over from one line and said how did you get over here? And went away saying there were three or five sessions

When people fawned over the apolstle wearing dark sunglasses in the bright sun - it was surreal hushed voices, did everyone have their clean white hankies

It came in a second rush when temple booties paper disposable footwear was passed down the desirable line and the other line stood watching as those families going into the temple stooped and hunched over putting them on. Everyone in either line had to have current temple recommends and tickets to get on the bus to come to their session of the temple dedication

It came in a third rush when after sitting In rows and rows of chairs through the dedication I watched my dark suited husband's Nordic cheekbones short hair put his dark glasses on like a g man surrounded by waves of suited men putting their raybans dark glasses on their mostly pale faces wearing their dark suits on their wide tall shoulders their arms moving in a delayed wave right hands sweeping up to their high cheekbones a round slim face all around at once in a simultaneous wave as they entered the sun spilling forth from the temple

A fourth rush seeing row upon row upon row of bus spilling forth unrecognizable dark suited men teens older children women hushed and expectant quietly submitted to get in their line
As we were flagged into our row upon row of buses leading to assorted ward parking lots

It struck me as the next group peered in out of the bright sun peeled off their sun glasses expectantly walking into the stake center or temple and peered into the dark out of the sun

Oh my, this description sent shivers down my spine!

The temple to me, although weird, was not a big deal. To me it was more like another boring church meeting.

The kicker for me was the mission experience. The way the church expects missionaries to act, the way the Mission President is viewed as a "supreme authority" over the lives of the missionaries.

The way questioning was never allowed.

Over all it made me realize the culture/attitude of the mission field was consistent with the culture attitude of the church as a whole.

I think the exact moment was when an investigator asked me this:

"Does the church force you to stay on your missions?"

And as my companion rambled off an "explanation" I realized the answer was yes. I mean not physically, but I was in an emotional/mental prison for sure. And that's how cults work.

I think the lightening bolt moment was a sacrament I attended in Arizona back when prop 8 was in play. I was visiting my kids and sitting in the cultural hall because we arrived late. The main speaker was living in Mexico and worked with the American Consolute there (I didn't miss that although he wasn't a general authority he was in an obvious position of power). I could tell he was really uncomfortable with what he had been asked to speak about. The message I got from it however, was that regardless of what our conscience told us we should follow the words of the prophet. That he would never lead us astray and because of that we all needed to call, write letters etc to the California State Politicians telling them to vote for prop 8. (this is, of course, a very short synopsis of what was a very slick speach)

I felt sick. That's when I 'knew beyond a shadow of a doubt' that it was wrong. wrong wrong wrong wrong.

I walked out of the meeting a bit in shock and that's when it hit me that what I had been holding tight to wasn't an iron rod, it was a mushy turd and it stunk to high heaven.

Sitting in the back row in the endowment session watching the wave of people all dressed in white speaking and moving in unison. It looked like the pics i'd seen of Mooney weddings.The veiled faces.

Being afraid to ask certain questions or bring up certain topics. Knowing that I could be ex'd if I didn't stop searching for answers.

Being chastised for not making a lesson on sexual assault 'more spiritual'. Getting dirty looks and the cold shoulder when I said I KNEW a bishops son who raped little girls.

Being told to read the same nonsensical book over and over and over.

Being criticized for going to college. Being criticized for having hobbies.

Being told my home should be open to anyone from church day or night.

So many more little red flags. They wouldn't stop popping up. I with drew. I moved to a new ward. I made a point of sitting in the back for 6 months and just listening and watching people before I made friends. After 6 months I realized there wasn't one person in that ward that I wanted to be friends with. It was obvious they were a bunch of snot nosed debbie downers.

for who knows how long. We had been separated for about 10 years. During the years even before I met him, I was questioning. Then when he told me he is gay, I became over the top TBM trying to save him. He and I both had a lot of questions though. We watched Steve Benson's story and the September 6, etc. We had our own experiences with leaders that were horrible.

My best friend's daughter was getting married in the temple. Every time she had a problem with wedding preparations, she'd say, 'the church is still true, so why does it matter." I thought about that statement for a few days and then I wrote in my journal "It mattered to me." It was that day that, no matter how long I'd wondered, it fell apart in an instant.

I didn't know that much history. I found that out later. My life experience brought me to that point.

Weird beliefs and rituals don't make a cult. There are weird beliefs and rituals in nearly every religion. What makes LDS a cult is their mind control tactics.

The first time I read through the website howcultswork.com I knew LDS was a cult. We're all lucky to be out.

The prayer circle in the temple

I didn't want to admit that I had been in a cult until years after I had left. I just always considered TSCC to be a really screwed up church, but not a cult. That was a word I reserved for People's Temple, Moonies, Scientology, David Koresh, etc. But now I realize that it truly is a cult, & what's worse is that it has smaller, more sick cults within it - the cult of the temple & the cult of the MTC.

Reading the temple prep pamphlet at age 18: "signs and tokes to enter heaven" and "covenants that you can't talk about outside the temple". My reaction was, how is this different than the BoM secret combinations where they had signs and tokens, and asked for loyalty before knowing what they would be told to do? The fact that nobody was willing to answer that question confirmed that it was indeed a cult.

finalfrontier Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Reading the temple prep pamphlet at age 18: "signs
> and tokes to enter heaven"

If there were tokes in the temple I'd still be eager to attend.

That is hilarious! Trying to imagine that couple smoking pot together. She looks like she just got out of a pioneer day RS lesson.

The temple

"You want to touch me WHERE?????"
*smack*



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/09/2014 08:28AM by Stumbling.

As a bishopric member participating in a "disciplinary council". People being asked questions about sex acts with others.

Sitting next to my father in the 2nd row during my first endowment, I knew something was not right. I was a die-hard "christian" in the mormon sense, and what I was seeing for the first time flew hard in the face of everything I thought I believed.

strange handshakes
penalties - throat and belly slitting gestures
pay lay ale being chanted while we raised our hands around a circle - (I wanted to walk out so bad at that point)
Watching my mother and my friend's mothers cover their faces
Bakers hats
Strings
talking to people through a sheet


I was truly shaken and physically sick to my stomach. I was asked several times in the locker room whether I was alright as I looked so pale.

Asked my Bishop/Father on the way out what that was all about?

He wouldn't discuss it and never has.

Several months later - on mission in German Speaking country and reading the book of mormon intently with my newly developed German language skills, I slowly realized that the book of mormon read like a comic book.

I was reading it one night just prior to falling asleep and I started thinking about the Temple.

A light shone above my head....just kidding.

A lightbulb felt like it literally turned on in my head.

I didn't know exactly what was going on but in the span of about 15 seconds I knew that something was deeply wrong with the church I was representing. I felt that same sick feeling but this time I knew it wasn't right.

But the pressure was so great and I was so immature I felt trapped. I spent the next year and a half with a pasted on smile and just pretended that I cared. But I felt sick every single day.

I didn't read or teach from the book of mormon if I could help it the rest of my mission. I subtly talked people out of listening to me during street presentations. I listened to potential convert concerns and empathized instead of using the sales techniques I was taught. I refused to talk to the mission president about anything of substance. I read every book given to me by anti mormons.

All the emphasizing and kindness backfired and resulted in a string of baptisms. I was known as the baptizing missionary and in a mission that averaged less than one baptism per missionary during the mission, I taught the discussions all the way through to 12 people who joined.

I didn't baptize or confirm one of them. I always had a companion baptize and someone from ward confirm.

When I came home, I never went through an endowment session again.
Not even when I married.

Despite knowing on my mission that it was a crock - it still took me several years to openly admit to everyone I knew that I thought that the church was not "true".

To me this is how you know you are in a cult. You are afraid to speak openly about your doubts or thoughts and the pressure to conform is so great, it takes years and some maturity to break free.

Another sign - When you do break free - no one in the cult cares about your opinion anymore. If they really cared about you, they would ask why you disagree...but they don't.

On my way out the "singles ward" went to a diamondbacks game as an activity. They all met up at the wardhouse and caravanned (sp?) from queen creek to downtown phoenix. They all sat together, separate from all the heathens, and generally looked uncomfortable and immature: like little kids hanging out at a grownup party.

My buddy and I had taken shooters of vodka and poured them into our sprite and were having a great time, sitting several rows up from the group, talking to strangers and making friends, commenting on how silly the mormons looked.

I realized that they really were a peculiar people and not in a good way. They were... weird. Culty, even.

About a week later there was an activity at the mesa temple (too long ago to remember what). I was talking to this girl who seemed normal to me and she mentioned that she and her friends had been trying on wedding dresses that day.

I asked her if she was engaged and she said no. I said it must be one of her friends who is getting married and she said no, they just like to go try on wedding dresses every other weekend ... f.o.r. f.u.n.

That was my last activity...

I didn't know it was a cult until about five years ago when I began to compare many of the teachings with other Christian religions (a full-on study). It also helped that I started to read on some ex-mo sites and talked to some friends who were going though the hard times of leaving TSCC. It is hard to call something a cult when you have been a member since birth--

I did leave it in 1988.

One moment in particular was when I had a calling where the bishop wanted me to call people in the ward and find out where in their homes their computers were located. Were their computers in a public place? Was computer time limited? Did they have appropriate software to block certain sites?

The fact that most people didn't seem bothered by the intrusive questions when I called, as well as the fact that I actually did what the bishop asked even though I thought it was a huge invasion of privacy made me suspect that Mormonism wasn't just a church.

Or, the 9-step list to track down "lost sheep" by the means of USPS forwarding search, phone search, visit to all known local addresses, internet search, etc. This really bothered me, and I shredded the tracking forms that were assigned to me.

There were two moments.

First one happened while I was a struggling single parent with a bunch of small kids. The SP (a survivalist prepper) had a "revelation" that everyone in the stake needed to tie down their water heaters in a certain way so that when the Big Quake hit, the water heaters would not cause damage or fires.

He ordered all the HTs in the ward to go round and inspect people's water heaters to make sure they were tied down properly -- not to help any of them do it, mind you -- just to make sure it was being done. When they showed up at my door, my reply to them involved a lot of swear words. They reported me to the Bishop, who chastised me and said he'd yank my recommend if I didn't tie down my water heater immediately.

"Wow," I thought, "this is getting weird, maybe cultlike."

The second one was the "Aha!" moment that caused me to quit going altogether. I'd gone back to school so I could support my kids. During a break between classes, I was standing outside with two classmates; one offered me a sip of coffee.
When I started to decline for Mormon reasons, she said, "Do you think God really cares what kind of beverage you drink?"

The light bulb went on. I drank the coffee. I realized that no, if there was a deity of the whole universe, he/she wasn't going to micromanage my beverage choices. Only a cult would do that.