I've been wanting to write my thoughts and feelings about this friend of mine. We've been friends for a looong time but now that I am not an active mormon and have learned about assigned friends, fake friendships and lds only friends, I've wondered if our friendship would survived or if it was even a true friendship afterall. But that will be for another day.

She called me for Christmas and I called her for New Year's.

Today I got a simple email from her, just saying hey, how are you? Normally I wouldn't think any of it, except that between Thrusday and Saturday I got one phone call from the Bishop, one from the RS president and two from the HPG leader. I temporarily disconnected my voice mail and nobody was able to leave a message. I didn't pick up any of the calls, even though I was home. Anyway, this email is so casual that it makes me wonder if on Sunday she was asked to contact me. It's Tuesday today so it kind of makes sense. The email is from yesterday but I saw it today.

I dislike being so skeptical of her email so I thought I would ask you guys. What do you think?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/05/2013 03:37PM by deconverted2010.

My guess is it is coincidence.

Spy.

I would just be aware of what you tell her. If you really want to find out, you can tell her something that you haven't told anyone, even if it's made up. I realized that one of my "friends", who is actually the ward bitch, and everyone knows it, was only calling and texting me to pump me for information so she could run around telling everyone. She asked me about whether we were drinking alcohol, and I told her I didn't know if we were going to try it or not. She told me some good starter things to try, and the next thing I know, there are rumors that we are out drinking. I cut her off cold turkey.

Probably spy. But I like this ^^^ approach because it may confirm whether or not she is on a "mission" to friendship you or if it is genuine friendship.

I hope it is really friendship, but there are too many undercover visiting teacher stories on the board for me to believe it is true friendship.

and find out who your VTs are. And while you are at it, tell her you won't be taking Vts anymore.

Also, if it's not your friend, talk to her and get her to promise not ever to BECOME your VT. The church likes to use friendships that way, and some members accept, not seeing the harm it poses to a friendship. It would be a good time to tell your friend how harmful it is for the church to use people to get info about other people, and how that destroys trust and privacy. Who knows, you might even plant a few seeds of doubt

I think the most important thing here is to find out if your friendship is compromised, and to take steps to avoid it if it's not too late.

I would guess that with all of these coming together, your name was brought up at Ward Council and as part of the concerted effort, the RS Prez assigned her to use your friendship to get a foot in the door.

As an active member we did this all the time.
As an inactive family they did it to us for a while.

As Inspector Clouseau would say "trust no one and suspect everyone".

Sad when you can't take people at their word, but unfortunately mormonism creates social game playing.

My guess would be that your friend likes you but also she's hoping to to influence you into mormon ways.

Wait a week or two before answering her email and see what, if anything, happens.

When you do respond, mention how members have been bothering you (and list what you mentioned in your post here) and how glad you are that she is not like that.

Throwing in the comment about her not becoming your HT would also probably be a good idea, if you want to make an effort to protect and salvage this friendship.

Good luck

Thanks for your input. I think that it is very likely I am once again on "the list" in the Ward Council meetings.

I'll wait to hear what she has to say and then take it with a grain of salt. I do have to be careful. And I do hope our friendship survives.

It is sad how intrusive the church is, it gets in people's lives, in their brains, in their marriages and relationships, it gets in their friendship's, their time and especially in their pockets.

No friends is far preferable to fake friends.

Of course you're just assuming that the OP wouldn't have any friends if one weren't assigned to her.

Unless you have reason to suspect that you are the target of the Strengthening the Church Committee (Here's the clue, if you aint a high profile person who has been publicly critical of the Church, you probably isn't a target), then I would urge caution against this talk "spies".

Here are the facts; at the local level the wards and stakes have auxilaries and committes of auxilary leaders who are largely ineffective "meeting-go-to-ers". In other words, they go to meetings to discuss Ward/Stake initiatives which often include some level of coordination on reactivation efforts, fellowshipping, and potential converts. While the Church generally get's a rep for being well organized, these meetings are generally poorly executed, where action plans and follow ups are talking points and nothing more. In other words, action plans rarely result in "action", and follow up is even more scant.

The take away from this is yes, if you are active, and you have a friend in the Ward who is active, then just bet on it. Somewhere along the line they have asked to provide information to these committees in order to evaluate the Ward plan for trying to reactivate you. None of this means that your friend is not sincere in their concern for you, or their friendship. They are just trying to live in a world where these social structures and inherent pressures exist. In other words, unless you have other reasons to be skeptical, just trust that your friend is being your friend...and even if you find that they do have some ulterior agenda, it's still probably something that comes from a personal concern for you, rather than something that functions as a byproduct of this well oiled intelligence infrastructure from the Ward. I've been in many Wards, and I'm afraid none of them are really that good.

The fact is ALL official and unofficial church gossip meetings, planning sessions, and disjointed efforts are rude and inappropriate regardless of the motives.

Yes Cheryl, I agree. At the end of the day gossip, nosey neighbors, and meddling, are all shitty behaviors regardless of whether an institution supports those behaviors or not.

Still, I would assume that RFM wouldn't have much value if most of the people who comment here didn't at one participate in the Mormon Church. This would include some, like me perhaps, who might have even participated in some of those auxilaries. I am on a point on the continuum of my life where I can look back, see those meetings for what they were, and extricate them from my life. At the same time, while I can look back with a little more clarity and critical insight, my intentions were never simply to gossip, be nosey, or meddle. I was just doing my job! I expect that a good number of our still Mormon friends are in the same boat. It's easy to get carried away and let our frustruations with the Church institution cause us to unfairly miss-judge the character of it's lay (non-paid, non-decision making, workforce) membership. It's very possible that many of those people are just at a different point on the continuum than we are at, but that some of them might actually find themselves at my current point later. That causes me to be a little more sympathetic to their present position. I would've hoped for the same.

No, good intentions mean zero to me, expecially when they are projected from mind reading.

No, it's wrong to connive against former members and non-members at meetings and planning sessions. Excuses, motives, reasons be damned. People have a right to go to church or not without such childish churchy interference.

If you were part of the problem, get over it and stop blaming your victims.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/05/2013 10:20PM by Cheryl.

I was part of the problem. The first victim I stopped blaming was myself.

Friends who have an agenda for you--to change you or manage your life--are not your real friends.

Friends who discuss your personal life with others are not your real friends.

You wrote:
"Somewhere along the line they have asked to provide information to these committees in order to evaluate the Ward plan for trying to reactivate you. None of this means that your friend is not sincere in their concern for you, or their friendship."

A friend who has true concern for her COULD actually provide personal information to other people. But then they would have breached trust, and hurt their friend by providing information that would be used to manipulate, and possibly damage a friend's reputation through gossip.

The fact that this kind of talking about people is considered NORMAL at the LDS church doesn't mean that it should be tolerated by anyone. What needs to happen is for this kind of behavior to be brought to light. Nobody wants to be the topic of a ward council meeting. People deserve to have privacy and to have their religious choices respected. I wish that I had had the courage to speak up and voice my misgivings at similar meetings. I KNEW that stuff was none of my business.

Try to imagine the group of leaders and your friend sitting around a table having a conversation about you. What would they be saying? What would your friend be saying?

The church has no business getting into you relationships like that. It makes me sick.

If your friend is going along with it, I would reconsider that friendship. You will have to guard everything you say to her, knowing that it could go back to everyone in the ward.

If she is an active Mormon her real loyalty will be to the church,not to you.
Bank on it.

a heart beat if she's a real friend or not. A real friend couldn't care less what your beliefs are.

Intuition. Everyone has it and there is a high percentage that you are right. It has happened to me on several occasions and it's hurtful.

Unfortunately they are right. I agreed and went to lunch with one 'friend'. I actually like her. But it was awkward. We really don't have much in common. She relaxed towards the end and I think forgot that I was 'inactive' and started to talk about another mutual friends life plans. She made a somewhat snide remark about them wanting to move to Utah to be close to their son, because their other local kids here are all inactive. Wow. I let it just roll like I hadn't really heard that. Guess what...haven't heard from her since, she did her 'duty'.... And not once did she ask why I'm never at church. It was the big white elephant in the room.

I'm 8 years out of the LDS church, and, after many individual struggles with different Mormon friends--for various reasons--not one of those friendships has survived.

Try to not get too angry, and please don't take it personally! It is not you, it is her. Remember that the cult comes FIRST, ahead of any friendship.

Yes, she's a spy. Yes, the Mormon cult has its little spy meetings every Sunday morning. Nothing is private. Mormons have no respect for others or their boundaries.

I dont want to encourage your worries,but i would be carful what you say. I ve had a simular experiance with a nieghborhood freind who LDS.Sha seemed very freindly but we didnt talk regularly. after about 2 mos. she called me right after thanksgiving saying she KNEW I must be depressed(cause of the Holidays and living alone). It was interesting cause I wasnt;I had a very nice dinner at some friends. But as I was telling her about a nieghbor; I heard 2 people talking!1 asking who I was talking about !

All Mormons are told to become your "friend" and to spy on you. One leg is both the same. In Mormonism, all is hazy and distorted. She may actually think that spying on you is also being your friend.

Why don't you come straight out and ask her?

"Are you interested in my welfare because you love me and care about me as your friend, or have you been assigned to report back the answers to the questions you've been given to ask me?"