Freind asked me to help her single parent mom with teenage son being wooed into the flock by teenage girl her family.
I sent her the following:
"I am quite willing to help if I can. 99% depends on the boy’s willingness to read and research. It would be helpful for mom to check out exmormon.org and post her dilemma to the forum there. Her situation is an every other day problem. There are folks there from every career discipline and so can provide the best of advice.
It is important to understand two things.
One. It is not mom’s fault if after trying that a child may succumb to Mormonism. You must make peace with that fact and not fall into a guilt pattern because of it.
Two. Most mormoms are not educated or are just enough so with church history info to say church vetted reasons for uncomfortable church actions and history. They just don’t know, don’t want to know and are not lying on purpose. Generally they are good people who have been given literally hundreds and thousands of hours of instruction that has had a serious lack of informed consent, misrepresentation to the public and lots of rewritten history to protect “testimony” and to present a faith promoting view inside and out of a supposed true church.
The Book of Mormon (contrary to what I was taught in forty years as a Mormon) and all the pictures the church has produced for classes at church and published in church publications is the very real fact that Joseph Smith dictated, not translated the, Book of Mormon by putting his seer stone in his hat, a stone that was previously used for hunting for supposed treasure in the dirt, blocking out all the light by putting his face in the hat and as he saw words come across the rock he would give them to his scribe. If the word was not transcribed correctly they could not continue until it was correct. The gold plates were not in the house during this process. This is how ALL witnesses saw it done. What the church portrays is something else. This is not anti-mormon and this process was even taught to an obscure group of men already deeply invested in Mormonism and an article was published by the church (which next to no one reads) about the talk that was given. It can be found at LDS.org in the July Ensign 1993
https://www.lds.org/ensign/1993/07/a-treasured-testament Where they try to put a faithful spin on putting a rock in a hat.
Information is omitted but even so one MUST believe that The BOM came to be in this manner. Even children would laugh at such a thing and that is why all of us are shown something else at church. Because the church can say they published this nonsense in an obscure internal magazine they can claim that they are “open” with their history and that anything to the contrary is anti-mormon. Why then did I and millions not know this little tidbit of info that changed my worldview and my view of church origins?
One tact that I thought of was to possibly get the boy to read the stories (maybe as a personal research project) of ex-Jehovah Witnesses and ex- Scientologists. After reading their stories then have him read ex-mormon stories. All have the same experiences in and out of those organizations.
How to get a young person to see logic, honesty and integrity past the veil of the love bombing when nature is driving the brain to do everything but these things has caused many a nation to fall (Troy comes to mind).
I would say that there are a couple of very solid questions that the boy needs to ask himself and the girl. This question has only one answer that holds a shred of integrity. “If the church was not true, would I want to know about that?” Both parties need to be able to answer yes.
One question the boy must ask the girl. “If I never become Mormon although I will always be a good person would you still marry me?” She will probably tell him that she cannot marry anyone outside the Temple. No one should have to be a slave to the religious beliefs of their partner. It will never last long term and capitulating early on will set one up for a future spousal disaster that very well may involve children, making it much worse.
Trust me there are hundreds of thousands of Mormon married couples going through disastrous times right now because the things that were hidden and called anti-mormon are being learned by many due to the free access to information not previously available to the masses that “anti-mormon nonsense” is actually factual.
Not only couples but teenagers and even missionaries out in the world are struggling as they learn what was withheld from them at church which is that the religion that they were born into is not the fountain of truth as they were taught and these kids are frightened as to how family and friends will react if they out themselves. You would not believe how many missionaries and students at BYU are in this predicament of participating to make others happy but not believing at all.
As a spouse learns that not only is the church not true but that it is impossible to be what it claims is tearing families apart as one spouse sees reason and the other retreats into belief because of fear due to their whole world being built by Mormonism and they are completely lost as how there could be any future without it.
The boy needs to know that this future of a torn family is what he is setting himself up for.
Richard Packham has a great site that for all things Mormon as he used to be one. He has great info for non-mormons about what the missionaries won’t tell an investigator. Read this site then invite the missionaries over and ask them these truthful but uncomfortable questions in front of the boy. They won’t have good answers and it will show big time. Inoculation against Mormonism by example is a very good route to take in early conversion situations.
The boy could, (as a test) ask the girls mom or dad if they went to the temple before 1990. If they did he can ask them if they drew their thumbs across their throat, chest and abdomen and as they did so they said the words “I will not reveal the first token of the melchezidek priesthood and its accompanying sign lest my life be taken”. All temple goers before 1990 did this. The boy must ask himself “is this a sacred act?” Second is it OK to lie about it? Christ said he does nothing in secret. Why would Mormons keep temple secrets? Sacred but not secret is the excuse. If you are forbidden to talk about it, that is called a secret. End of discussion.
I have five children. The two boys are out. The girls are still in with their husbands and children. It is hard as a father to have my girls think of me a lost, wanting to sin, too lazy to live the gospel and other trite and fallacious reasons for leaving the church. They will not even ask me why I left. The church has frightened them that much. If they remain in Mormonism they will always see their father as a lesser than person who was caught in Satan’s cunning grasp.
What they will never see is the man who looked in the mirror one day and asked himself “If the church is true I will verify. If it is not I want to know about that. They will never know about the man who took the courage and did so against all the fears that I was taught to hold me in check, to make me self-censor from seeing the world as it actually is and not the fearful scary “world” that the church told me it was.
I was a Mormon for forty years. I know what all Mormons were and now are taught. Here are some solid Non-anti Mormon sites with fantastic info with solid references. To be quite truthful I have never met an anti-mormon such as described by the church. Only those for pro-truth. The word anti-mormon is a Mormon made trigger when heard shuts down the brain and sends the believer into protect my testimony at all costs mode. No reason or logic can penetrate such a barrier.
There is a litany of things that the boy will give up in life that he is unaware of as of now. The list is huge. I will make that list or you can go to exmormon.org fourm and post just such question. You WILL be amazed.
Unfortunately mom will need to educate herself about allthings Mormon. MOM MUST GO SLOW so as to not alienate the child! I cannot say this enough! Give him his agency or it will be used as a weapon against you by the lovebombers. Do things like: hey son, I learned something about the church, this is it, what do you think about that?
http://cesletter.com/Powerful info packed into a free PDF. Download and see if your son will read it. See if the girl will read it. Honest questions from a believing young Mormon man to a Church Educations System Director. This letter was never answered. If the church has all the answers then why not reply? The best thing ever to get an honest Mormon to see that the church has valid and serious problems that are not anti-mormon in the least.
http://mormonthink.com/The best resource for church based information on the web. It give pro’s and cons. Nothing is misrepresented and it is run by Mormons wanting other Mormons to know the truth about the LDS church. It also freely include information for LDS apologetics. The site is unbiased and lets the reader decide.
“MormonThink has been produced primarily by members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who are interested in the historical accuracy of the church and how it is being taught to its members and portrayed in the media.”
http://packham.n4m.org/tract.htmWhat the missionaries won’t tell you. Go to his home page and scroll down to Mormonism. Many very good topics including “Help! the Mormons have my child”
http://www.iamanexmormon.com/Videos of some who have left. Sincere and honest.
Good luck mom. If I can be of further assistance let me know."