They know who they are, if they are still lurking, as do a couple of other people on here from Orange county. I hadn't seen this nephew and his wife for quite a few years, and yesterday the two of them and I and TBM DW were able to meet for breakfast and talk church--or lack of it, be like. Then we went and watched "Hugo," a great movie incidentally. So publicly I'd like to say, Hey, it was great. Glad it happened. Glad to know there are others in the family who have figured it out. Sorry I had to figure it out so slowly, too.

One of the relatives of my BIL at the funeral is a pastor for the Quakers or Society of Friends. I had several talks with him and his wife about my growing up Mormon, about my leaving, and about religion and Christianity. They were very loving and very professional. They did not bash Mormonism except to agree that it is very sad that the Mormon church seems to sit on billions of dollars that they don't free up for humanitarian aid; they hadn't even heard of City Creek, but they new about the wealth of the LDS church and their dearth of humanitarian activities. He dang near made me want to embrace religion again if only I could be in a congregation run by someone like him. I think that day is pretty far off, though.

I've always thought that if I *had* to attend a church, it would be the quakers. There's that little matter of my atheism though.

There is a Quaker Minister here in Indiana that writes fiction and non fiction books named Phillip Gulley. When he wrote his first non-fiction book (If Grace Is True), all the christain book stores pulled all his fiction books off the shelf because his ideas were so "wild."

It has been interesting to see how his ideas have changed over time and his changing thoughts and feelings can be captured in his non fiction writing as well. Even thought I am agnostic, i love this author. He is a very good story teller...He has a FB page too and often throws out question/statements that get ineresting responses.

https://www.facebook.com/#!/philip.gulley



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/02/2011 10:36AM by ladybug.

Anti-establishment pacifists eh? Now there's something to aspire to.

Religion, Mrs View?

'I'm an atheist anti-establishment pacifist.'

Well it's that or keep looking into FSM....

I'm not logged in.......AnonyMs here.

Yeah...you were able to spend some time together and talk church. How did your wife do with the exmo conversation?

OK will see Hugo.

Hi to E and D..........if you're reading this. :)
See you on the 11th?

K

She was surprisingly resilient. We went to the only thing available for breakfast, a Panera Bread. As we walked in the door, E. said something like, "This is where we go for our ex-Mo meet-ups." I saw it register with DW, who didn't know that they had left the church, and that getting together for possible chats about this was our not-so-open agenda. Then soon after we began eating, D. asked me to give detail on a close relative who I had said was no longer a believer. DW surprised me by not only not being addled by the question, but by being the one who launched the information and filled in the details. Then afterward she said, "I guess that they aren't church members anymore, huh?" That's when I was more up-front and told her they had both left some years ago, without giving her the specific dates, and that we had more or less bumped into each other on-line. She wondered what D.'s mom would say about it if she knew, but we both know she suspects even if she does not know the details. His dad already told me he suspected that they never went to church anymore.

Go see "Hugo." Great movie. See you on FB.

Cludgie, it was great to meet and chat with you and DW. We only wish we had more time to delve deeper... still so many questions. We didn't realize that DW didn't know about us, we assumed you'd filled her in. Wow, her head must have been spinning...

Yeah, MIL doesn't have a clue how far "lost" we are, milk before meat, as they say. As Whatshisname has never acknowledged we left the church he thought talking about you would be a good segue into telling her about us. He mentioned to her this morning that we recently found out you no longer go to church. She said that she loves you and you're her only kin but that you are very liberal and that you visit "anti websites" and Facebook where you and your online friends get worked up and bash the church. Then Whatshisname acknowledged to her that we don't go anymore either, and she said she knew but we don't bad mouth the church around her. Then Whatshisname told her how we actually had "bumped into" you in an online "support group for recovering mormons". (he phrased it this positive way so she wouldn't write it off as an "anti" or angry site) She mentioned you're a "conspiracy theorist" and that you had written a "14 page manifesto" against the church.

MIL mentioned the relative who is a pastor for the Quakers and said she needs to email them before you do and tell them to "take what you say with a grain of salt". Good thing she's not controlling;)

Unfortunately we didn't have much time to talk at this point and nothing was brought up about the "close relative who is no longer a believer". Most likely this is something whatshisname will have to bring up because MIL won't likely broach that subject.

We had rehearsed possible scenarios of how the conversation might go, but it hadn't occurred to me (us) that it would end up the way it did. Our anticipation was all geared toward her freaking out about our status and grilling us. In hindsight it makes sense that she would have to believe Cludgie is just off his rocker or influenced by "anti" sites rather than face the idea that the church isn't what it claims to be.

AnonyMs, YES we'll see you on the 11th!!

((Whoa. Calm down. Apply the skills you learned in Mormonism. Puuuush it down. Puuush. Deep inside until no one sees it anymore. There. Good. Now, smiley emoticons, smiley emoticons. :-) :-) :-) :-) ))



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/2011 11:11AM by cludgie.

Wait a minute, your original post was a refreshing point of view. Maybe we should do this by email instead? Anyway, sorry we didn't mean to get you all fired up.

Hoping that she really does see someone (who can up her meds), most likely through LDS services though and I think more than an fervent prayer is required.

Of course we know you aren't a conspiracy theorist. And whatshisname said to me last night, I'd like to read that so called "manifesto" :) It's all a process... I'm not sure where this latest round will lead for either of us but glad we know there is someone else in the family that will share our point of view on things.

I understand the distance thing... we did a stint of that as well. We are constantly trying to live our lives as we see fit rather than in service of the expectations of others (that side of the family). We have earned the label of black sheep and others, so we've heard. The other two siblings tend to cater to expectations and tow the line...

In fact, I sent an E-mail to whatsHISname (say, what is his name, anyway?) and explained a lot of this. You're not the only black sheep. Turns out there's a whole flock. In fact, there are really only a couple of white sheep.