I was just reading keyboardcowboy's post about wanting to be excommunicated and it got me thinking and about how leaving is a great opportunity to get your fill of fun through good natured mischief making and playing with the rigid social roles of mormon culture. All in good fun of course, because fun is a great way to work through the feelings of betrayal and and being abused by religious authority.

I agree it is a complete waste of energy to think you are going to rock the active LDS boat very hard by trying to make a scene. You will be very disappointed if that's what you are expecting.

However, if I would have given myself more time to think about the humor of it all I would have had a lot more fun with breaking off my social ties to the ward I was in and the church in general, if only for my own enjoyment.

There is a lot of fun to be had with messing with people who take you seriously when you are just fooling around and think you are someone that you are not. As an undercover exmo the opportunities are priceless.

I would sell my soul to be an undercover exmo again!

But alas, I took myself a little too seriously and cut off all communication so everybody assumed I was offended because of something.

Think of the fun...

Have a calling? Abuse it.
I was clerk while I was leaving and I would just hang out in the clerk room and pull friends in for secret interviews.

Have Mormon friends that want to reactivate you? Go to their mormon parties and reveal your exmo status.
I still go to Mormon parties every once in a while and I am usually able to have a lot of fun with that. The best part is when they ask me what ward I'm in and I tell them I resigned my membership from the church. The following questions and look in their eye are priceless.

I love it, but as far as being able to secretly abuse my membership status, those days are over for me.

Feelings of regret and betrayal are to be expected as you leave, but fun and humor are just as natural.

[Serious guilt inducing prophet voice]
I beg any current undercover exmo *within the sound of my voice to please view your exit as an opportunity for hilarity, a source of joy.

By all means go out with a bang if you feel so inclined, but just don't expect it to really matter to anybody else. Do it in the name of fun and do it for yourself.


*Hinkley reference



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/04/2011 06:10PM by Brian M.

I am kind of undercover exmo. 10 year old child not baptized is a bit of a red flag. It is fun to make "innocent" totally naive comments. :) Especially to the family. I don't have it in me to waste time at church. The last time I went, I cringed at references about Catholics and Pagans.

LOL In the lesson meeting on my last day there they brought up the subject of how much of an awesome feeling it would be to go to the temple. They asked us all how we would feel to go to the temple. There were 3 new people there too. It came time to me to answer the question and I replied in all seriousness..."I don't know because I can't afford to go to the temple" Should have seen how red the guys face got. He even actually left and went and told the big dog.

Should I go back just for the fun of it and get it recorded on my phone video?? I will take requests on what to say/do as long as it is legal. I most certainly will do that. I got no fear of the people there whatsoever. They attempted to make my life a living hell so I got no respect for them.

You got to laugh at things man. I was losing my sense of humor during my brief stint in the cult. So many members wanted to laugh but didn't know how. They would fake laugh at the stupidest things. I could just sense the lack of fun in their lives. You dont have to be as vulgar as Dice Clay to have a sense of humor, but at the same time you got to have fun.

Glad you all are out of that mess!

Lmao..can't afford it !

stormy

Probably one of the best opportunities to have a little fun while making a hilarious scene is to offer to say a prayer, and say a bunch of strange things that are actually true according to LDS teachings that aren't emphasized. This would take a little practice to make sure you don't screw it up but make a list of funny things to say.

Just off the top of my head:


Our dear sweet Elohim,
we come before thy throne where thou sits near the great star Kolob
and we thank thee for our savior Jehovah and the prophet Joseph Smith for restoring precious truths which we have talked about today.

We thank thee especially for the Book of Abraham which he claimed to translate from an egyptian funeral text that actually only contains the customary burial ceremony of the egyptians and has nothing to do with Abraham.

We thank thee for the ability to ignore these contradictions and to continue to accept and follow all the other claims of current church leaders despite the fact that the church cannot be what it claims to be.

We ask that thou wilt help us to not be tempted to wonder why the Book of Mormon contains many direct quotes from the New Testament and visit websites such as exmormon.org and eventually resign our membership from the LDS church by emailing Greg Dodge at church headquarters.

We say these things in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen
(If you get this far just end it normal as if you were serious the whole time).


Ok then if you want to really really make a big scene add in some references to the temple ceremony. I know this would actually hurt a lot of members feelings, but they'll get over it eventually and forget, and maybe in some sense also think it is funny and laugh about it later.

Such as:

We thank thee that we are given a new name in the temple, which is the First Token of the Aaronic Priesthood and that we have covenanted never to reveal it to anyone, mine is "Sam." Whoops, I didn't mean to say that out loud, please forgive me for this horrible sin.

This wouldn't work for you since you said you hadn't been to the temple, but then in that case do this one...

We thank thee that thou hast changed the temple ceremony many times to remove the more offensive portions. Such as in the washing and anointing where a temple worker would touch near your genitals as they blessed your loins. We thank thee that this is no longer done.

We are very grateful that the death penalties were removed from the endowment in 1990, where we would pretend to slit our throat and said we would rather our life would be taken then reveal the first token of the Aaronic Priesthood.

You would likely be stopped in mid sentence by some priesthood leader, but it would be hilarious to see how long it would take them to stop you.

It would be best for someone to do this in a Relief Society Meeting because the women would probably not try to intervene, Sacrament meeting would have the biggest audience, but a Sunday school or priesthood meeting would be funny too.

If you can pull something like this off and record it, I am sure it would be a cherished source of laughs for many years to come.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/05/2011 05:33PM by Brian M.

I had a family member ask me why I didn't go to the temple. I told them I couldn't afford the membership dues.

keyboardcowboy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
>
> Should I go back just for the fun of it and get it
> recorded on my phone video?? I will take requests
> on what to say/do as long as it is legal. I most
> certainly will do that.


Go to next months F&T meeting, get someone (if you can) to film you bearing your untestimony, and film from the pulpit if you can. That would make an excellent video - Millions of hits on Youtube perhaps!

I agree.

If you do something to make a big splash, do it to entertain yourself because the Mormons will just write you off. To them you will be acting exactly like evil apostates would act and that reinforces their beliefs.

Nope. I just started posting here. I would do my full name but I don't like the idea of being google-able.

I am just a 25 year old exmo from Boise and I'm coming up on my 2 years of freedom from authoritarian religion!

For all you Boiseans, I wonder if you know who I am or know any one in my family?

My last name starts with "Me" and ends with "lander."

And in these two years the best medicine for recovery is without a doubt humor and realizing that a shifting worldview at some point in your life is very common for the billions of people that have been raised in institutions influenced by either Christianity, Islam, and Judaism.

Realizing this has made me see that I actually have a lot in common with billions of people not just the culture of the intermountain western US. A shattered worldview is a life event for a lot of people, so there is no reason to feel special or singled out about it.

Tragedy is a great source material for comedy. Think of all the great Jewish comedians: Woody Allen, the cast of Seinfield (Jerry Seinfield, Jason Alexander).



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/05/2011 06:33PM by Brian M.

I was somewhat undercover at the end. Although I really hadn't believed in it for years I at least acted like I did. But the last year or two I was a financial clerk and used it as an opportunity to plant seeds of doubt. Whenever doctrinal topics came up when counting money with the bp counselors I would try and plant a seed or two. Whether it was about some kookie thing Joseph Fielding Smith had taught or errors in the scriptures I would try and use the opportunity to educate the counselors. I tried to not "offend" of course. Unfortunately, I think the only one who figured out what I was doing and was somewhat influenced by me was the bish. His counselors were just too clueless about church doctrine to make a dent. When I told the bp it was time for me to go, he got me released promptly. I think having an apostate around bothered them.

do a Betty Bowers or President Paternoster act and the absurd piety, supported by actual traditional teachings that are mostly ignored these days, could wake a lot of people up. They are usually in full defensive mode when they think they are in the presence of an evil doubter or apostate. But when someone is putting on an act of extreme piety, they are more likely to see the absurdity of many of the things that ChurchCo teaches and does.

Ex: Sister Betty Bowers gets up and bears testimony about the great wisdom of the Brethren in refusing to disclose how Church finances are handled. "We don't need to know these things. God has appointed his wisest, smartest and most honorable men as our leaders. We don't need to worry that they might spend church assets on things that would be more beneficial to their friends, their relatives or to wealthy Mormons than to the church as a whole. Why should we doubt it? We don't need to worry that they might spend significant amounts of money on purchasing counterfeit historical documents that they thought were genuine. We know it's all in good hands and that whole thing with Mark Hoffman was just a part of the battle between good and evil. There were casualties, but the Brethren did everything just the way that God wanted them to. If you don't believe me, just ask one of the Brethren. I saythesethingsinthenameofjesusamen.

You could also stick subversive materials, exmo posts and the like into hymn books when nobody is looking. Or post them on bulletin boards. ;o)