I am currently watching Leah Remini's television series on Scientology. The Scientologists tend to be way worse than mormonism, and they get away with it. They appear to use psychological pressure to keep people in involuntary servitude for years or even a whole lifetime. They break up families using some of the same tactics used by mormonism except they don't even hide it as mormons do. The church simply demands that you disassociate with your family members. It's institutionalized. But even as bad as they are, there is another side to the arguement. Whether or not you buy it, there is another side to the arguement (a little research I did on my own). And so they continue on doing what they do, fighting back at their attackers, and forging ahead with their mission.

I expect that mormonism will always do the same. But the mormon church is different than scientology. What are the worst crimes and infractions that the mormon church should have to be held accountable for? I thought it might be interesting to see what the most common grievances are here all in one thread, and to possibly see if anyone has any ideas as to how to punish the church for these things (keeping everything strictly legal in the process). You can't create a documentary based on theological arguements or inuendo. You've got to be able to put your finger on exactly the core issues and offenses and how those offenses harm people and you have to do it for a few convincing hours.

1.) Worst grievances
2.) What to do about it

Anyone want to comment?



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 05/30/2017 10:50AM by azsteve.

Sorry, that list is too long for me, but anyone truly interest can contact me for my list...

just sayin'

Child sex interviews
Misinformation
Money extortion from families
Endless and useless meetings

"the church" never did anything to me.
Or anyone else.

*People* did stupid, nasty, ridiculous things -- claiming "the church" as their source of authority.

Other people in the church were kind, generous, and wonderful people.

So, when it comes right down to it, my issue is with the people in "the church" who are horrible human beings, and with the fact that there are enough of them in "the church" to constitute a majority, and continue encouraging them to be horrible human beings, and claim to be doing so in the name of "god."

"The church" is what the members make it. If enough members decided to be kind, honest, generous, loving human beings, "the church" would be very different from what it is not (and has been). It continues as a source of authority for horrible human beings because it contains enough horrible human beings to constitute a majority.

I totally agree with you. How should we answer the claim that the church is a hospital for sinners, not a resort for the saints? It's a sincere question, not trolling.

Some churches may be.

Mormonism isn't.

It's an enabler for the arrogant and inhumane.
Its majority (and leadership) rewards such behavior, while condemning with no empathy "sinners."

If the "hospital" analogy were followed through with mormonism, it would be a hospital that treats human kindness as a disease, and discharges as "healed" those who want nothing more than to treat their fellow human beings with contempt and disgust.

Using untrained and, most often, clueless leadership robs a church-goer of the professionalism expected of a pastor in about any other church.

- Likely the biggest thing I was robbed of was a dignified setting in which to learn of the death of my father. Instead, I heard about my father's death while showering at a Boy Scout function at the University of Utah. As I was showering, the bishop came in, took off his clothes, and came into the shower and began to tell me how my father was "called home to be with Heavenly Father." I don't think anyone here would not think that this was anything but the most alarming and inappropriate venue in which to learn about the death of a family member. I found out shortly afterward that he had told all the people I was with, including all the other scouts, about my father's death before he told me. Who does this sort of thing?

- Being fed the whole line about the necessity of going on a mission. The mission robbed me of two years of university, and of life in general.

- Having to put up with and go to meetings led by some very clueless and controlling asshole leaders. I've had to go to meetings at 6am to hear the bishop get angry about this or that. I've been called in the small hours of the night by the bishop, getting me out of bed and telling me to drive into an unsafe part of town to give a blessing to some person I've never seen or met, just because the unemployed bishop didn't want to be inconvenienced.

The rotten apples in the church have done many things not only to my family, but myself also. One thing that will always stand out in my mind is the time when my TBM boss believed a couple of psycho co-workers and tried to throw me under the bus. The reason was because I was being a whistle-blower on the two, because of some very unethical things they were doing. I was forced to "meet" with her, her boss, and two CEO's. I was the one on trial. The one CEO pointed to my Viking necklace and said that he had been on a mission to Norway, and that the Vikings weren't tall and physically or mentally strong as previously believed. It was his veiled threat to me to back down or else. Afterwards, my boss wrote up a hateful, performance review of me that was full of lies. This was probably because I had threatened legal action. All of them are active TBMS'.

The responses to this thread are very interesting. Unlike with Scientology, so far the grievances are with other church members who act inappropriately, often in the name of god. The church itself seems to be guilty mostly of taking money they don't deserve, and creating the environment wherein terrible people are either taught or encouraged to do immoral things, often in the name of god.

I know that the church is completely dismissive of any arguement that someone was offended. It's also blantently obvious that the church doesn't apologize for specific things that they should apologize for, nor do they require church members to apologize when appropriate, to eachother. The only apology I have ever heard from the church was during a plea at General Conference to get inactives to return wherein someone said "if we have offended you, we're sorry" (hardly a sincere effort to right wrongs). Unlike the Scientologists, is the church's only sin that of narcissism and the breeding of narcissism in others?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/30/2017 10:58AM by azsteve.

Wasted my time.

That's what the church did to me.

The church's policy of being divinely right on EVERYTHING under the sun and then demanding monetary resources to carry on god's work is the biggest crime of all. Parental rights are really nonexistent at this point.....parents who take a different path from the cult are maligned.....who cares what the parent says?

Good question. Maybe hard to answer easily as there really are SO many things..

I agree with the robbing me of my time with endless pointless meetings.

And it robbed me of my parents. We were left largely to look are ourselves because our parents were too busy with all of their church meetings, duties, callings, scripture study, reading all the books by all the GAs ever written, basically being so fanatical and addicted to their religion they completely neglected the 7 kids they had.

So there was the neglect and then there were other forms of abuse.

I can say it was abuse by members (in particular my older brother) and so maybe the 'church' isn't to blame, but it IS to blame since the source of the doctrine which teaches, encourages and condones abuse Is the the church and that is the source of the problems. To say it's the members and not the church to me is way off point since really an organization is only as good as it's members and if the members are mainly abusive and controlling and domineering (male dominance and subjugation of women and children via their priesthood powers and patriarchal order), than this reflects on what the church is actually teaching.

You just have to look at the teachings, the doctrine itself and then how this doctrine is implemented (control, brainwashing tactics) to see that the church is the problem. It was founded by a child molesting power hungry greedy lying cheating thieving murdering con man. And the prophets that came after him were no better and even worse.

What about the Blood Atonement DOCTRINE! And it's practice for decades in the early church? Slitting the throats of members of your own family and congregation to free them of their sins???!!

What about the doctrine of polygamy? What about the doctrine in re. to blind obedience to those in authority? Obedience and submission to men by the women?

The doctrine is responsible for the actions of it's members. Yes there are some kind people who are members but they are only kind to a point. Apart from the more obvious forms of abuse, there is the more insidious type of abuse that is largely psychological and emotional. Think of the 'nice' members who still think it's okay to tell you how to live your life and think it's okay to tell your secrets to the bishop and other family members, things you told in confidence. Think of how much they just 'love' you but then 'hate' your 'sins' and thereby shame and shun you. Think of all of the guilt trips and feelings of unworthiness that all the kind and good members wrought upon your head with your own 'best interests' at heart.

And just their attitudes about women and their 'roles'.. There is no respect for true free agency at all. So you cannot ever have real respect for your life choices if they don't match up with what the leaders want from you.

There are many members I have loved and been close to and been good friends with in the past. But the friendships and family connections only went so far. And now honestly there is not one Mormon (active believing Mormon) who I can call a true friend, who would be someone who does NOT JUDGE me and whom I can truly trust and who can actually love me unconditionally. I have never found anyone able to love without conditions in that organization even though they love to throw the word around (unconditional love) they have no idea of the meaning.

My scars are mostly emotional but they are deep. The LDS cult robbed me of my ability to believe in myself, to trust my own instincts, to feel worthy. I have lost most of my life to feelings of unworthiness. I have had to battle with depression, anxiety and PTSD because of my treatment in that 'church.' by ALL of it's members, well intentioned or not. They are ALL abusive in some way though largely ignorant of that fact. They don't see how they neglect their family. They think by bringing them to more and more meetings they are caring for them but really neglecting their true needs. How can they know anything about them when they neglect their own.

Everyone in that organization is a SERVANT of God.. they don't think they should even have their own needs.. it's all about that God wants of them, and so what the church wants and demands of them. This comes first. So the neglect is rampant and unavoidable. With the neglect comes other forms of abuse. Corporal punishment is common in families and often this is taken too far, with parents over reached and stressed out, sleep deprived and frustrated they easily lash out at their children in many ways.

I had an abusive brother, It was mostly emotional abuse and mind games. He never got punished. My parents refused to acknowledge it. It was clear to me the double standards for men and women. Clear that I was not as important as the male members of the family. Clear that my role was to obey them and never complain even in the face of terrible abuse.

I had to then believe that I really was unworthy and accept my place. But it was misery and it took me a long time to see that it wasn't true what I had been taught about myself. I still battle with this. It's very deeply imbedded, these kinds of beliefs.

I personally don't see how Scientology is that much worse if at all. I see a lot of parallels. I think it's just always easier to see the craziness of another cult (one not so familiar to us) than to see the craziness of the one we've been involved in. I always noticed this in my own family, they could easily poke fun of other religions and see the brain washing mind control going on, but just couldn't see the similarities with their own beliefs.

I've also suffered more than the regular abuse from the real sociopaths in the LDS 'church' because they don't have any consequences. Whether or not anyone wants to see the more insidious common emotional abuse that goes on in the church, you can maybe see then how more overly abusive types just get away with their abuse because the system seems to have no controls to deal with it, or they ignore it because of political reasons, or the members don't know how to identify and deal with it or don't report it due to their own shame and confusion (which is what happened in my own case when clergy members abused their positions and abused my trust).

It seems to me from my experiences and the stories I hear that child abuse including sexual abuse, and also physical abuse to children and wives as well as abuse by clergy members is rampant in the LDS organization and the cases where it doesn't happen is actually less the norm and more the exception.

Members of the 'church' suffer with low self esteem due to the teachings and doctrines and practices of the church. The members are riddled with guilt and self doubt. They don't know how to identify and report abuse. They are fearful of their secret 'sins' (most likely really benign ones) getting out, of being told on by other members, by their family, and afraid of what the bishop knows about them through confessions.

They are controlled by giving of their time and talents and resources to the church/cult (and they even VOW oaths in the temple to do all of the above! and until recently they swore to their own deaths!!!!.. the temple rituals alone should be enough evidence to prove the church is a cult no better than any other), by having more kids than they can provide for (and by working overtime in order to attempt to provide for them), and they are controlled emotionally through all the emotionally manipulative teachings in the meetings at church, and they are controlled through guilt and the chain of command in the hierarchy.

It robbed me of my trust, my child like trust in my parents in the church leaders and teachers. It betrayed me at every turn.

It robbed me of my life. I've had to fight every step of the way to regain my power and get my life back even decades after 'leaving'.. it doesn't 'leave' you so easily.

It is a cult. No better than Scientology or any other.

I agree, Shapeshifter.

Shapeshifter,
Thank you so much for what you've taken the time to say. It's everything that I need to say, but just haven't had the energy to put it out there.

Mormonism stole my life. It did that in too many ways to even write it all down. I won't live long enough to recover from it all. However, I'm hoping that my kids who were exposed to it, but not forced into it, will be able to overcome it. My grandkids will not be subjected to it. So, if leaving the church did nothing for me, it has at least spared my grandkids that I have now, or will have in the future.

Your take on what it does to the members (each and every one) is right on. So many of them don't see it and never will. That's the sad part that destroys people, and families. It's the most anti family religion i've ever had the misfortune to learn about.

Thank you again for your time, effort, and insight.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/04/2017 01:48AM by janis.

Btw, Cludgie, that is SO wrong about how you were told about your father's death! How terrible for you!!!

It's a great example though of how Mormons have no clue about boundaries or respect to individuals. The control is so deep that they seem largely unaware. Though that move by the bishop, almost feels intentional. I think sometimes it is intentional (esp. by the higher ups) because it is another way to have and maintain power over the members, by overstepping boundaries like that and not allowing someone dignity or room for personal grieving.

It's too awful.

People here have speculated that he might have been trying to abuse me. I was alone with the bishop, and the other scouts and adults had been sent away. Odd that how the bishop needed a shower just as I did. Well, anyway, he didn't abuse me. But he was later excommunicated. Ward members were forbidden to discuss it or ask about it. It was years later (in fact, only about 5 years ago) that I learned he had been arrested for something that happened in the restroom of a department store. Hmm. He was my bishop AND high school principal. The incident, whatever it was, ruined him in more ways than one.

Mostly I just look at it as, why would any kind of church leader anywhere tell everyone that a kid's father had died, telling all of them to go get lost while he told me? Then tell me in the shower while both of us were naked (and alone)? Weird. Weird, weird, weird.

Oh that is SO creepy! I was thinking that too, how inappropriate to be in the shower with you like that.

Even if he didn't outright abuse you in terms of any touching etc. The fact that he was with you naked like that is already crossing a line and I think IS abuse. Just like when someone flashes you and it feels awful and creepy, it's because it's a violation of your boundaries and privacy.

And then to go and tell you that news, something very very personal and deeply affecting, in that setting, is DEFINITELY abusive.

But I can see that you get that now.

I think that emotional abuse though is so much harder to recognize in general because it's sneakier than outright physical abuse. And for that reason I think it's very pervasive in the Mormon church, as a manipulative control device.

It's very effective too, as it's firstly hard to prove and so be dealt with officially. And secondly because it makes you doubt yourself (the Gas-Lighting effect) and so eats away at you, slowly but surely breaking your will as you feel no longer able to trust your own knowing/ your own judgment. So then people further hand that judgment over 'to God' but really to the 'leadership' so that then you are totally and completely controlled.

It's really awful. I am sorry you had to go through that creepy emotionally violating incident. And sorry that he abused others, I was going to say in 'worse' ways, but you really can't judge it. All forms of abuse are equally bad. And again the harder to identify ones can be worse sometimes since they are so crazy making!

And I am glad he was finally brought to some kind of justice. But unfortunately it probably had to be really really bad if nobody was allowed to talk about it!

Cludgie, This has always been one of the creepiest bishop stories I've ever heard. Yes, it was abuse.

I didn't understand when I was 16 that my bishop was verbally sexually abusing me by asking me very pointed sexual questions and talking about icky sexual things (to make sure I knew what they were so I wouldn't do them). I will always believe he was jacking off behind his desk while he was making me feel like shit.

He was also a counselor at my high school. My first couple of years, I wished he were my counselor but we were assigned alphabetically by last name. But I'd hear other kids say how they thought he was weird and creepy and I'd be hurt cause he was our bishop. But later after my experience, I always wondered if he felt he had a right to talk sexual to girls at school. Back then we wouldn't have thought we had anyone to talk to about it, or even that he didn't have a right to talk that way.

The untrained clergy of mormondumb is NOTHING to be proud of. It's one of the worst things about the religion.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/30/2017 03:27PM by NormaRae.

I, too, thought it was suspect and had assumed it was some kind of communal showers when the scouts were mentioned but was again confused when stated was just poster & bish showering, not a group.

All the clues are there, and with hindsight it is especially clear that he 'hoped' you would turn to him for comfort, whilst you were both naked. Perv.

Pretending that kind of behaviour is innocent is how scandals like the recent jimmy saville scandal (google it) in the UK are enabled in the first place. Why on earth would a bish be naked with teenagers? Wrong, so wrong.

That bishop was hardly 'avoiding the appearance of evil' now, was he? But of course he was assured in his position of trust that his behaviour would never be called out.

If no-one is allowed to discuss why he was later ex-ed then it had to do with taboo subjects of either practising polygamy on the quiet or being a sexual deviant in another manner. Frauds and thefts always get found out and passed around the grapevine, only serious stuff gets clamped down to save the church from further embarassment and the congregations from questioning the divine callings some men (and women) get.

sick sick sick. The creep was probably hoping for a melt down and a chance to hug and comfort you while you were both stark naked. Sick son of a bitch. It makes me sick and angry when I hear these stories. There are more of these stories in mormonism than there are scriptures or GA talks.

They say you're only as sick as your secrets. The mormon church is one sick and disgusting institution.

The more of us that escape, the better.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/04/2017 01:58AM by janis.

Okay I thought of more. Sorry for long ranting posts. But for once I feel I have a platform to really voice my opinion about the LDS church after years of remaining largely silent, mainly so as not to 'offend' my family or rock the boat too much. Even though I left many years ago.. I am now really gaining understanding about the scars it has left to have been raised that way..

So a couple more..

It robs you of your ability to reason, to ask questions, to exercise your intellect (this in addition to rob you of your own instinctual feelings about things).. pretty much taking over all parts of your brain and body.

It robbed my parents of the ability to self reflect and thereby take responsibility for wrong actions. (And many of the 'wrong actions' were condoned as 'righteous' actions by the church.)

The strict definitions of roles expected for both men and women (and children) extremely limited my options and choices growing up. I had to fight hard to do anything outside of those roles, that might not be seen as 'suitable' for a young woman (like being involved in art projects and theatre and dance). If I had had more 'normal' (non religious cult indoctrinated) parents I could have potentially had encouragement to pursue my interests and could have gone a lot farther with those endeavors than I have.

Because even now I have internal conflicts about my art and pursuits and it takes a lot to keep believing in myself without a support system and to keep doing it even if it's just to feel satisfied about it in myself and it doesn't end up being earth shattering in a wider reaching influence. I struggle to be okay with doing things for myself and for no other reason. This is from the indoctrination. For believing I have to put everyone else first, esp. the church and God first. That my own needs and interests and passions are irrelevant.

It's maybe the saddest thing of all to rob someone of the things that really make life worth living to them. The things they have true interests in and talent for.

It never mattered when my work got published or hung in galleries. Or when I was featured in newspapers for dance performance. My parents hardly cared at all (this in my adult life after leaving). They DID care when my ex-husband got HIS work published though. Because he being male, well it just mattered, his achievements in the world counted for something and mine didn't. The only thing that ever seemed to count was me 'finally' getting married (not in the temple, not to a mormon) even if outside the faith, because it was something that a woman could do that counted. If I had kids I'd get further praise and attention. But I haven't so I don't.

It doesn't matter how many amazing things I've accomplished. None of it matters to them. It makes me feel as I always did with them and at church, like I am invisible.

We are social creatures and as much as I can tell myself it's okay that my achievements and interests don't matter to my family it DOES get to me, even still. Probably will be a battle I have to fight my whole life, just to be able to get to a place of acceptance of myself and care for myself. To be able to love myself wholly and without conditions. Something I never got at home or at church.

It can be just as limiting and oppressive for men, being boxed in like that, consigned to a role from birth. No choice of your own to pursue what you like, esp. things that aren't good money makers.. how will you have a large family if you can't provide for them? So many men have to abandon their dreams and passions and put them aside to do their duty. Bury their feelings about it. Go through the motions of life without ever truly living.

It robs one of everything truly good about being alive, it takes away your whole life. This one chance to live here and now.

We have to stand up and take it back, take back our power, our minds, our feelings, our bodies and our lives. It's up to us. We DO have a choice, we just have to know it, and know that our true birthright is to have this choice, to have joy.

The only one thing Joe Smith said that ever made any sense (though a complete contradiction to just about everything else he said), is that 'men (and I will add women here) are that they might have joy.'

'Joy' is what makes you personally individually feel alive and fulfilled and purposeful and peaceful. It's not something others can define for you and tell you to accept their version of it. It's living your passions fearlessly, being true to your own self and first knowing your own self.

People are afraid of their true natures thinking they are sinful, but this is wrong. This is a lie (except maybe for the small percentage of sociopaths), we are born with conscience (again excepting sociopaths :)), and already have a sense of right and wrong, it does not have to be taught to us at church. We can rely on our own abilities to empathize and relate and care. And we can rely on our own instincts to guide us. Religions rob us of these innate qualities and distort everything and use it for control.

Really the most moral kind honest trust worthy people I have met were raised without any kind of religion. And for the most part the manipulative abusers have been religious and use God and religion as their excuse to inflict harm on others.

So yes, the list is pretty much endless, the wrong doing in the LDS 'church'.. in essence it robs you life liberty and the pursuit of happiness, all things promised us in the constitution.

Wonderfully said, about people being robbed of their belief that enjoying the things they enjoy, and being who they really are, caring about what they really care about. Thanks.

The biggest for me was wasting thousands of hours hours of my time, money, and emotional energy towards something a clearly false religion. Had I known the facts I would not have spent 2 years of my young adulthood on a mission. Had I known the facts, my family would not have spent their retirement going towards tithing for a billion dollar corporation.

The crime for me is intentionally withholding information from me as a young Mormon that would allowed me to make informed decisions about my belief system.

Here here! (or is it 'hear hear' ?)

Anyway Very well put!!!

It IS a billion dollar corporate empire and it's all about getting control over members so they can take their resource forever. It's a parasite, a vampire. I used to have nightmares about my father and then my boyfriend turning to vampires and sucking out my life blood. A perfect metaphor for their emotional abuse and domination over my life!

I love your name to. 'Ex-CultMember' You hit the nail on the head there!

And YES, withholding information!!!!!!! We were NOT allowed informed decisions!!!! All those people, mostly very young, going through the temple with NO CLUE what they are getting into! And we don't get information about the truth of church history. So much covered up. So many lies. Terrible! Wrong, wrong wrong!

You're wrong on both counts. The term is, "Hyeah-hyeah!"

2 thoughts:

1. Someone above talked about "professionalism" expected of pastors, and how that was NOT there for him when his bishop informed him of his father's death.

My experience as a nevermo in churches is that even "paid" clergy vary in their experience and skill to help parishoners through something like that. A pastor friend told me that he had had almost no training on that kind of thing in seminary!!

(To me the details of the specific incident are worse than insensitivity; I also think there was serious lack of boundaries that amounts to abuse.)

2. Someone expressed that there are kind, generous, honest, etc. people and ones who are not, and that The Church as an entity does not do things to people.

I agree about the kind, etc. people, for sure. I don't agree about the church as an entity, however. I believe that the church sets people up by its structure and by the lies it teaches, which is what I think this rfm board has been such a help to me, married to an active TDM---to understand.

In order to get to the CK, you have to follow a bunch of rules, including marrying in the temple, and staying temple worthy, right? So, especially previous to 1990, you had to submit to massive personal boundary violations in order to meet this qualification for "returning to Heavenly Father." You were taught by the church's example that to supposedly give someone a free choice, you could SAY they had a choice, but then withhold some of the pertinent information about what that choice and its consequences entailed. You were taught all kinds of mental gymnastics in order to believe, and then keep what you believed, secret--I mean, sacred. To an outsider all this is bizarre and dishonest. In Mormonism, this is "normal."

The institution itself does do things to people.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/30/2017 03:58PM by relievedtolearn.

Of course, as a nevermo, tscc has never done anything to me, personally, except for the shunning and judgment I have received from neighbors in the past and the exclusion of my daughter from birthday parties, etc. when we first moved to Utah.

From the stories I have read on this site, I would think that the inappropriate bishops' interviews, especially with preteens, would rank at or very near the top of the list.

The extortion of money from members via 'tithing' and other requests/demands for money for other purposes. In some cases, at the expense of food and other necessities for the family is also a grievous harm done to members. IMO.

The blaming of victims in cases of sexual abuse (eg via the 'honor code' at BYU).

They blame the victims for any discomfort or hurt that is inflicted from other members. I was an embarrassed mishie that was stuck riding in a missionary vehicle that was driving around town with 3 unruly servants of the Lord. They were yelling at people that had the misfortune of walking down the street when a red Ford Focus happened to pass by. It went against my nature to tattle on people, but my pleas for them to stop went unheard. In the morning, I tried to contact the mission office, but my companion kept hanging up the phone. When I attempted to leave the apartment, I was tackled. The other set then arrived and one of them called the MP to report that I had left the apartment by myself. They also reported that I was armed with a slingshot. This triggered a manhunt by the other DL and ZL to rush over to the apartment. It also caused the MP to make a detour to sort it all out.

I was interviewed last. That allowed the 3 liars to rehearse a false story that set me up as the liar and be branded as the troublemaker. I so hated being told that I needed to get along with others. The MP also stated that if I would learn to like playing basketball then some of my shortcomings would be solved.

I forgot the best part. The MP asked me why I didn't just get out of the car if the behavior of the other three elders was so offensive. He said, "You see Elder Goop, that's what you would have done if there was any truth to your story."



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/30/2017 04:50PM by messygoop.

To me, personally? The worst things - and fair warning, this is going to be a bit heavy - are probably the perfectionism, internalized homophobia, and recurrent feelings of failure. Being in the church, and especially attending BYU, left me with so many horrible experiences. Miscellaneous memories related to the church include crying into my arms during seminary as the teacher gave a Boyd K. Packer-inspired homophobic lesson (at the time I was actually thinking about Stuart Matis, who shot himself in front of my church meetinghouse), walking in on my first girlfriend painting a picture with blood from her own arm (I was attending BYU-I at the time), and listening to my BoM professor at BYU in Provo talk about how gay sex should be equated with murder/rape/bestiality/etc.
I'm genuinely surprised all that didn't kill me, but the remaining psychological effects are hard to live with. And I feel like I've been robbed of some of the more fun things in life. My first date with a girl was to a park where she attempted suicide. My first kiss was shortly before she was sent to a behavioral health center for suicidality. My first hookup was with a different girl at BYU-I who was also depressed and suicidal. While on an individual basis some of that can be attributed to factors outside of mormonism (genetic, for instance), depression and suicide are abnormally prevalent issue within the LGBT mormon community.

How horrible Ren! I am so sorry you had to go through that. I had a BF in High school try to kill himself and my family (nor did anyone at church) did NOT get how much that affected me! It was a very lonely place to be. And I just can't imagine how awful it must have been for you to endure those hate speeches. I don't remember having to hear any of those but I might not have been as aware of LGBT issues at the time (it was the 80s, so a lot of people in the closet still). I did have closeted gay friends at the Y and some of them eventually came out to me and some other close friends. So I started to get an idea of how hard it was for them with the pressures to conform and 'repent', deny who they are, think themselves sinners for their natural feelings, etc. It's just too awful. I know my parents tended to be homophobic. But they've been better in the last decade or so, partly because of the times and better portrayals on TV shows but also because a close friend of theirs at church told them her sister is a lesbian and she is proud of her and she won't dare let anyone say anything negative against her sister. She was bravely boldly open to the point that my parents had to learn to accept that. They may still secretly think it's wrong but they keep it to themselves now.

I also finally got sick of hiding my gay friends from my family at some point. And this was also when I came out about my leaving TSCC. So one day my dad asks me 'whatever happened to that nice boy from BYU you were friends with.'' (He know I had liked him and once he was in town and visited the family). I finally just blurted out 'Dad, he is gay.' He obviously wasn't ready for an answer like that and then he sort of mumbled 'well I guess sometimes those artistic types…' trying to justify it to himself!

Ugh. Yes the homophobia is really damaging. And there whole 'love the sinner, hate the sin' message is awful and just stupid. They can't see how judging it is and how it makes people feel. The fact is they DO think it's sinful no matter how PC they are trying to be lately and they also think it's a choice.

The arrogance is damaging too. They are arrogant about so many things because they 'know' the 'truth'.. this attitude breeds arrogance and intolerance.

I'm glad you pulled through Ren. That is an awful lot to bear.

and that is doctrine. Sure, the people are the ones who represent the church, but them telling gays to marry straights is what they took from me and my ex.

And even for those who don't marry, like ren above, the gays and lesbians live with unimaginable damage.

I have to add that I also find cludgie's experience one of the worst I've heard on RfM.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/30/2017 06:10PM by cl2.

People did strange things that were unkind, rude, intrusive, etc. I cannot blame "the Church" for their behavior, completely. I had similar experiences with behavior that was rude, unkind and intrusive in my work experiences also. I also grew up with a bunch of "old wives tales" that were strange and bizarre! My life,in general, is a mixed bag of: "The Good, The Bad, The Ugly" just like everyone else!

I also had positive, helpful, kind experiences with people in the LDS Church, as well as in my work experiences. I gained a lot of experience in many of my "callings" that expanded my knowledge and skills greatly, that has helped me also, dealing with difficult people, in my life going forward.

The LDS Church takes positions that I did not agree with, even more so now that I am not a member. I am not conflicted anymore as they have no influence in my life anymore.

I never felt I was damaged by the religion. I had several very bizarre, outrageous experiences with people I thought were totally "out of order" and often treated like I didn't matter because I was a female. It was often very frustrating trying to work with some of the people. Others were very often very kind and helpful. Again, a mixed bag. We were all the recipients of ill informed, and totally unqualified leaders in far too many cases.

I hold the individual people responsible for what they did to me, mostly out of their ignorance. They just didn't know any better. They were, for the most part, totally oblivious to the fact they were being very rude, unkind, obtuse, and completely outside anything that resembles Christ-like behavior.
"Dumber than a box of rocks" often came to my mind!

All of their behavior was about them, not me. They told me who they were, at their core, which was very inept and uninformed about common decency and privacy and often lied, outright. Sometimes, even admitting it. Members lied in about every way possible, lied about times, places, who said what, where I was supposed to be, how I was supposed to follow instructions, and on and on. Terrible.

As a convert, trying to assimilate into the Mormon religion/culture was like trying to wear a dress that was the wrong size!



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/30/2017 09:23PM by SusieQ#1.

Not allowing temple divorces for women except in extreme circumstances, and sometimes not even then.

Not allowing a single parent to be sealed to their children. In order to make that happen you must remarry to a mormon that's willing and able to be sealed to you and your kids from another marriage. It's a hellish tangled mess that they've made no allowances for, and it's causing a ton of distress to a lot of people. The whole thing is just stupid and unnecessary.

So it looks like the worse offenses by the church are:
1.) Lieing
2.) Exploiting people for their time and money
3.) Rewarding bad behavior of church members
4.) Punishing victems as opposed to punishing abusers
5.) Violation of healthy boundries, including sexual boundries
6.) No healthy respect for others
7.) Demanding and expecting unwarranted obediance

The blood oaths and other oppressive tools used to obtain these ends are more tools and not so much things that in and of themselves, would bring condemnation against the church by others. To others outside of the church, it's just weird theology. It seems like the things to go after are the actions of the members. By their fruits ye shall know them.

WHAT ? as an outline of a multi volume book set. I got out to 800 pages in my auto biography and I figured that I was about 20 per cent done covering the topic.


But since you asked, Here is something that I compiled and posted just today. It has my MORmON brother angry enough to use the F word and make demands that I stop. I would really like to know what you and others think of it.


My MORmON Bishop Brother who is actually a pretty decent guy posted this as his mother's day tribute.


QUOTE
Happy Mothers Day to BLANKA BLANKA (who doesn't FB). You sacrificed the best years of your life raising a bunch of rowdy rambunctious boys who tried your patience each and every day of your life. We used your kitchen knifes as screw drivers (cause we lost all dads), your spoons for digging in the dirt and forks on each other. We broke your glasses and plates too and used your pots and pans for everything but cooking. We hand decorated your house with crayons, pens and markers mud and dirt. We spent all your extra hard earned money wearing out dozen of pairs of shoes by dragging them on the gravel road between our house and great grams house while sitting on the tailgate of dad's old dodge truck. We wore holes in the knees of our new tough skin jeans a couple days after you bought them and again even after you patched them repeatedly. We ate a weeks worth of food in just a few days. We rarely kept our toys or rooms picked up and probably never said pls or thank you enough even though you repeatedly taught us those things. Who knows how many lakes were drained with the amount of washing you did for six little boys bodies and their dirty closes daily. After we exhausted all your other motherly traits and abused and broke nearly every worldly possession you owned the one thing you never ran out of or held back on was your unconditional love for each of us. My greatest gift to you today on Mothers Day and each and every day of my life is to be the man you sacrificed and invested your whole life for me to be. I am because of who you are. ❤️ you endlessly.
UNQUOTE

Which was fine. After that, my other brother who is a world class screw up and a real dumb shit came up as a topic. His MORmON wife is even far worse than he is. So, to speak to the issue of him and my mother and MY upbringing in a rather oblique however very demonstrative way, I wrote and submitted the following:


QUOTE

QUOTE We broke your glasses... UNQUOTE ...oh, you mean drinking glasses ! I was thinking of something else because there was one person in the family who broke his own eye glasses with amazing frequency/ regularity. On one particular Saturday morning, in the Fall, mom and dad made a rush trip to Twin Falls to replace some broken glasses, eye glasses that is. They hoped to be in and out of Dr. Fox's office to replace some broken glasses well before Noon when that office closed, so they could get some other things done on their (all too brief, very full and very hectic ) Saturday. There was a lot that got done on that Saturday before Noon, including seeing the newly replaced broken eye glasses broken again ....before Noon. Mom was sick about what had happened. She openly noted in lamentation that the new eye glasses had cost very nearly 50 $ and that they had not even lasted intact for half of the day, and that the day when the new glasses were so briefly intact was a Saturday .........so the new glasses had not even come with in 24 hours or a day of making a trip to school with their wearer which was the real purpose of bothering to get the new eye glasses. Mom openly wondered how long it would be before they could come up with the money to get the another new pair of eye glasses. With that (frustration) in mind, she made a specific inquiry to a specific person into how their glasses had gotten broken, again. When a person is paying for stuff like that (wanton destruction), it seems natural to want to know exactly what brought it about. The reply was the typical report of a jumble of events. When clarification was called for, it was met with the cookie cutter response of "I ont oooohhhh ....it just happened", that had been heard in so many other instances of destructive mishap. Eventually the inquiry/ interrogation fizzled out as it transitioned into the cookie cutter moping (even though mom would never admit to moping, just as she would never admit to having asthma in those days) that mom regularly resorted to as the only compensation that she could get as stuff like the newly broken new glasses happened. I already had enough elementary math skills by then to know that 50 bucks was the better part of week's wages at the time for a person like the bread winner at our place. For anyone who would be interested, I can still remember and pin point the exact spot where that new pair of eye glasses were broken.

My parents had an extended debate about what to do that was intermingled with their repeated inspection of the newly broken glasses. While they were talking, they periodically re inspected the newly broken new eye glasses over and over, AS IF the glasses' condition might have somehow changed for the better in the intervening seconds that had passed. In spite of my parent's regular checking, the material of the broken eye glasses frame steadfastly remained in a state of damage that was well beyond repair. Wanting to be helpful, I offered the suggestion that baling wire would be just as good as the fragile material of the glasses frames that had already yielded, and that heavier thicker more stiff fencing wire, not to be confused with baling wire, would be even better, and just as relevant there was a ready plentiful supply of that resource that was much lower in cost than driving to Twin Falls to buy pricey eye glasses frames at an eye doctor's office.

Just as I wanted to be helpful, I had also managed to quite errantly assume the role of inquisitor that was exclusively reserved for elders, especially at times like this. To back me out of the conversation, I was told that fencing wire glasses frames were not even close to an acceptable alternative. When I asked why, I was given the highly summarized reason of "Because" with the included special emphasis that meant I was supposed to shut up. "Because" sounded so much like "I ont ohhhhh" to me at the time, because it was blatantly obvious that my parents could not afford to keep paying for more conventional eye glasses frames as fast as they could be broken, which apparently was pretty damn quickly, and with all other glasses frames alternatives ruled out by them then they were flatly left with nothing that they could do to get past the problem. With me and my proposed options that had been ruled unacceptable cut out of the discussion, my parents finally acknowledged to each other that they could not mend the material that made up the frame of the broken eye glasses. With that in mind, at that point, they wisely took the eye glasses away so that the new eye glasses could not be broken any more and /or completely destroyed, even if they had no idea of what else to do to remedy their eye glasses plight. UNQUOTE

I totally stand by the basic veracity of the above account. It is not embellished at all.

To which my other brother who has not been mentioned yet for the sake of clarity in that identity issue, who is actually a fairly decent person but who has a few short circuited moments then responded:

QUOTE WTF are you even talking about. This post started out as a very fitting tribute to our Mother let's keep it that way. Quit with your BS! UNQUOTE

I did not put the entire thread here, as that is just basic trivial pablum and what I did put here very aptly captures the thrust of things in the thread,

It seems to me that somebody is pretty uptight on the matter.

I am genuinely interested in any serious outside commentary on the matter.

......I mean, IF I am not allowed to talk about this relatively innocuous stuff how can I ever get around to the supposed dead baby eating and very real slashed throats of a friend and her baby who are very dead........

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vjc9Gk379wE&t=21s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0wFt1r3zYg&t=172s

Smirkorma..

Hmmmm… Well I don't see anything wrong with your story, I mean at least to initiate that kind of response. But I am not surprised at your brother's response because from my experience Mormon families can not handle anything that sounds like criticism of any kind. It may cut too close to the truth that things were not all rosy and perfect and they can't handle any hint of that since it may lead to introspection which as we know for a TBM is very dangerous territory. Like a game of Jenga, one piece taken away at the right spot may cause the whole thing to collapse.

I relate to your childhood frustrations of not being heard even when you had something good to contribute. This happened time and again during my childhood. And my parents job it seemed was to knock down anything I said because it felt like I was undermining authority and they needed desperately to maintain their positions of authority as that is a concept oh so dear to them. But I was naturally inquisitive and a deep thinker and really had a lot to contribute. But it wasn't allowed. And it made me consistently think like there was something wrong with me for trying to help and for asking questions. I didn't know how to change myself and I didn't know why I was always so wrong when the things I got punished for always seemed so innocent and insignificant. So over the years I learned that I was worthless and this is something I've had to struggle with through my adulthood. It's very damaging. And I am sorry you had to be treated the same way.

For me, being female made it even worse. In my 20s, my dad came into a lot of money (via stocks in the company he worked for, being sold).. Well he got too ambitious with it. He was naive and gullible and he quickly became prey to many financial predators. I could see it, my mom could see it. We tried to talk to him. My mom resorted to begging. He was investing is crazy things that clearly were risky. Well he didn't listen. And I felt that same way again, the child whose (good) ideas were ignored just because I was threatening my insecure parent's ideas of authority and righteousness (being right). How dare a child, esp. a daughter question her (priesthood holding) father? How dare a wife question her husband? This was all contrary to gospel teachings and temple ordinances where women swear obedience to their husbands, etc..

Well guess what he squandered it all. He had to remortgage their house, one they had nearly paid off and after he'd put this expensive addition on it. They had to sell at a loss, and almost had to foreclose. Then when he should have been retiring, he and my mom both had to take jobs, rent a house and then move out of state to a more affordable housing market where they now, well my dad, still works in his 70s!

This meant I got ZIP, ZILCH, NADA financial support EVER. Neither did some of the other kids who needed it. I paid my way through college and out of college etc. All those kids and grandkids get nothing now.

It was pretty damned serious and this all happened because of that same attitude you tried to illustrate.

Again I think the reactions are aggressive in their defensiveness because they don't want to reflect on problems in the family and your brother in particular doesn't want to feel guilty for things he may have done deliberately but never got punished for. Nobody wants to feel bad and they think you are causing them to feel bad and bursting their little fantasy world bubble.

However cute sounding the first post was from you other brother. I actually felt sad reading about all the shit your mom got put through. It sounded so familiar. There were 4 boys in my family and my mom must have gone through the same kind of endless pain and frustration dealing with their obvious disrespect. And the end of it, about his being one of the men she sacrificed her life for is also so sad. it's meant to be complimentary but they can't see how awful that is. The women are expected to sacrifice themselves for men and that's their basic duty, raison d'être in life. If the boys in your family had been taught differently, to actually respect their mother, and respect women in general, things could have been a lot different for her.

Did you really write 800 pages of an auto biography so far? I am curious because I am writing mine as well, right now just for myself, to finally really voice the truth about my upbringing and how it affected me. I am at over 100 pages and am still in the early years so I can see how it could get that long!

Good for you for doing that!

For me, during the summer of 1978, the church program to change my very essence was the worst. I was sent by church social services to BYU where electrodes were attached to my body and genitals and I was zapped with electricity. This went on once a week for two full months, until I met some people that told me I didn't have to do it, despite the blackmail that was being used against me by the church.

That is SO crazy! So sorry you went through that torture!

It has left me with Verizon guy syndrome and Honus Wagner's disease.

I wrote a fairly long and detailed accounting of abuse from the RS pres (which led very directly to my leaving the church) but when I tried to post it, I got that notice that the connection had been dropped or something. Frustrating.

Anyway, she was a witch, and that led to my departure. Apparently, her husband thought so, too. He left her, and last I heard, he had remarried somebody else.

In the end, her insistence on by-the-book compliance cost the church a pretty decent member.

I think it was Jeffery Holland who referred to the church as a hospital for sick people. It reminds me of my father-in-law's story. He had to be admitted to a hospital (this is in Peru) for pneumonia. He said every night for the four nights he was there, there were patients dying all around him. He got up, pulled out his iv, and escaped in his pajamas from the hospital using a back door! He took a taxi home and never went back. He went instead to a private doctor. He chose a better path for his life. This is just like escaping from the church. There were people all around me in the various meetings who were spiritually dying, if not dead already. It was time to get out and come alive again. I feel ever so much better getting out of their crazy "hospital".

OP for this thread here: I often refer here on this board, to the church as conducting a social engineering experiment that harms people. No one usually comments on those posts. We've seen a lot of people here on this board, and in this thread, show extreme dislike and animosity for the church. We've seen a lot of bad behavior by many church members. But no one has yet been able to say "the church leaders in Salt Lake and at the highest levels of the church do (whatever their worst wrong-doings are) and because of these specific actions, the church needs to be stopped, or is not worthy of continued existance".

So let's say that a major network television executive came to you and said "We want to fund and air a television series on the mormon church. We want it to be truthful, and to explain the side of the story as told by former church members". What would be your most lethal points against the church? Try to focus on common patterns and root causes that led to your harm, which can be backed up with examples like you read here on RFM, more-so just tossing out random bad things that have happened. Root causes as initiated globally by the church and especially if those global actions can't be easy to justify using theological arguements (the guy who was physically assaulted by Scientology's equivalent of the pope is a great example), then specific types of damages that would be reasonably expected to occur as a result of those specific actions that were taken by the church, and then (and only then) how you personally were harmed as a result.

If we can't succeed with this process, I think that the prospects of ever seeing a mormon version of 'Going Clear' on TV are pretty unlikely. All we can say now is that "these people and their religion are crazy". That is countered by all of the existing media images that makes the church seem as wholsome as baseball and apple pie, and those nice young men in white shirts and ties that ride their bikes down the street. No one seems to care about the insanity of mormon theology or how it harms people since they don't even know that it exists, until we can prove how and why.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 06/03/2017 03:11PM by azsteve.

Can some members avoid being harmed? Yes. But others are not so lucky if they are children or if they are caught in situations with no way out.

Those who brag about not letting the church hurt them for years are rather harsh to assume that everyone has some easy option as they did.

I left the minute I reached adulthood and could support myself and deal with being alone. Still, I had to recover from what my TBM family's church did to me from birth to when I could finally walk away. Growing up in polygamy or in the regular mainstream mormon church is a difficult burden which does do harm. TBMs are trained to see that no one can float through the experience unscathed. It's their job to see that the church grabs, changes, uses, and holds its members forever if possible. If that doesn't hurt people then they're either lucky to be in a cushier niche than some or they're cast in steel, which I don't see as a positive attribute.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/03/2017 04:24PM by Cheryl.

I think the church indoctrinated me so much as a child/young woman that the authentic me failed to mature.The church taught me subservience from the cradle, so I was receptive to the whiles of an abusive man and tolerated the intolerable. I was trained in weakness, to distrust the real me because "the natural man(woman) is an enemy to God". It prevented me from travelling as a young woman, it prevented me from following my heart in a career I would have loved, it made me meek and overly cautious, it encouraged me to rush headlong into a relationship and marriage with a highly unsuitable man, it taught me nothing about real, deep friendships, it blinkered me into hindering my own opportunities, to be a good girl, to look to the man for decision making instead of making my own decisions, it stifled me, ate up the person I could have been. It fed perfectionism and led to major insecurities and a negative self image

Really well put. I relate completely to your post 'overit'
It sounds like you are telling my own story. And I bet thousands of others could relate in the same way. It's definitely a pattern of abuse and destruction of self esteem and lives, not isolated incidents.

Wow ! These are sad and interesting stories. As I wrote my last post here, I had an insight that I thought to share here. I don't mind sharing it here because if someone can beat me to the punch, maybe they'll do a better job than I would. The name of my book or documentry should be called "In The Name of God" - if that name was not already used in a similar topic, in reference to mormon priesthood claims of authority to act in god's name. Perhaps it should focus on the abuses dealt out by the mormon priesthood, and the damages that have resulted. Some covered tops would cover the various temple ceremonies (Second Annointing, Oath of Vengence, blood Oaths, ineligibility of Blacks until 1978), ineptitude and malpractices of mormon clergy, ineligibility of women, exclusion of family members from marriage ceremonies, abuses by Brigham Young, and other related issues that have set the stage for all of the dysfunctions found in the mormon church today.

The role of mormon testimonies would need to be covered too. After these, the stories like these ones here would be very relevant. At the end, a plea could be made to not pay any tithing, nor to make any financial contributions until the church opens its books to the public, and until specific harmful behaviors stop.

Azsteve

You may want to check out this book if you haven't already. I'm just about to download it. It's on Amazon-

"Better Off Dead: The Lost Children of the Book of Mormon"

Apparently Utah has an incredibly high suicide rate, highest in the nation I think (LDS suicides) and this book goes into how TSCC influences this.

AND Utah is FIRST for the following-

Internet porn subscriptions
Anti-Depressent use
Number of sex crimes against children

And FOURTH for-

overdose of medications

SIXTH-

for number of number of child abuse convictions per year
for number of teachers terminated for sexual misconduct with students per year

And each day 2 youth (between 10-17) are treated for suicide attempts

And each day 2 young adults (18-24) are treated for suicide attempts

There is CLEARLY a HUGE problem here. All is NOT well in 'Zion' if these are the statistics.

The info in this book may help with your research. I do hope you make a documentary! Let me know if you do. My partner is a budding documentary film maker, maybe he could help.

Correction Not just Utah, it's called a 'suicide belt' that spans the western states where Mormon populations are highest, so Utah, Idaho, part of Nevada and Arizona.

This is alarming. I have a TBM stepson that is married and baby #4 is going to be born tomorrow. Her oldest sibling is 4.

SS is totally overwhelmed and never wanted all of these kids. His wife is one of those Uber righteous mormons who will be controlling his life until the day he dies. His needs/wants/desires mean nothing to her. I feel like he's just about hit the wall. I think all hell will break loose within a year or two.

It will make me sad for those darling kids, but so happy for stepson. I suspect he's gay (because he told me so) and he's finally realizing that being gay is for real. It's going to be messy, and I'm so sad for those kids. However, in the long run they will be much better off.

Why? I think I can speak for many that I'm at the point in "Forrest Gump" where Jenny is collapsed in the dirt. Sometimes, there aren't enough rocks. "My innocence is mine and you can't have it, you sick demented fucks". May TSCC suffer a long and disgraceful demise.

Intense pressure to marry early. Intense pressure to have many kids. At 23, I felt like I was old compared to my mission companions who got married at age 22.

Along comes a cute girl who liked me. I earnestly courted her for an extremely long 4 months before proposing. Got married another 4 long months later.

I Ignored many warning signs most notably a propensity for my wife to be depressed and anxious, and meddling in-laws who tried to helicopter her every move.

4 years into our marriage, and 2 children later she had a complete breakdown, was hospitalized, and was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. The most scary symptom was religious delusions of grandeur.

She slowly got better and became fairly self-sufficient again. I was very reluctant to have more kids given what had happened. But my father-in-law literally had a "visio"n of us having two more kids. Of course after that, my wife couldn't feel complete until we had two more kids.

So I gave in and we did. Then she got called a YW President. A still small voice told me the stress of having now 4 kids, including two young ones, along with a high-profile, time consuming calling would be bad for her. But of course it's bad to ever say no to a calling so I went against my better judgement and didn't say anything.

It wasn't five months later that the stress of leading Youth Conference prevented her from sleeping for 3 nights in a row. Then the religious delusions started again. She had a complete psychotic breakdown and spent a month in a psychiatric hospital and many more months getting back to a semi-functioning baseline.

Don't get me wrong, my family experience hasn't been all bad and I love each person on my family. I wouldn't want to live without them.

But the intense pressure to marry and have kids led me to make extremely important decisions without fully comprehending how completely life-altering they would be. Church teachings and culture on family directly influenced me to make decisions against my better judgement.

I told a nasty joke on the way back from a camping trip and the scoutmaster stopped the van yelled-"who said that"? I said "I did"-and he slapped me across my face twice. When I got home my dad (the elder's quorum president) talked to the scoutmaster and THEY worked it out. Today-that would be child abuse. Thinking back, I'm convinced that the indoctrination is a form of family abuse. Kids end up thinking they they are doing something wrong when they are just being kids-kids being ostracized or shamed when they are too young to understand it's not really their fault.

Mormonism divides families. The jack mormons are non believers get to wear a scarlet letter around the family-particularly an extended family, i.e., cousins, aunts, uncles, etc. A darwinian pecking order emerges with the believers being at the top and the non-believers at the bottom-kind of like a practice run for the after life.

Worst is the lies-MesoAmerica, horses, arrowheads, metals, dna, genetics, sexual rites in the temple, kolob, multiple wives in the afterlife, the truth about Joseph Smith and his cronies, Mtn Meadows. When I weighed these lies against belonging within my mormon family-it takes it's toll.

I'm glad I graduated from BYU-I just kinda went along-but things were simpler in the 70s. Am I crazy now that I spent those formative years in the mormon church-I think I am.