It occurred to me in another thread that probably the majority of people sitting in mormon pews today are there because of hope, rather than faith. And probably fear plays a part, as well! Hope, fear, habit, peer pressure... everything but real faith, are all chaining the low percentage of saints who attend to their pews.

You can suggest to a TBM, "if you had faith even the size of a mustard seed, you could tell that mountain to move, and it would move..." and you'd get a scowl and some dismissive rejoinder, but inside, TBMs know your suggestion is on target.

They don't KNOW that Joseph Smith is a prophet, that the temple ceremony is anything more that a silly tableau or that there's a celestial kingdom. They just hope/fear that it's true.

Especially the women.

Whether they have "faith" or not, they still don't KNOW any of the things they claim to "know." Faith is not knowledge. It's belief *without* knowledge, facts, or evidence. It IS "hope."

Why "especially the women" ?

Deep down I never wanted to know for sure that it was true.

I guess all along I was never a true believer.

Yay for me.

The 'especially the women' remark is pure opinion.

But something must be going on in the minds of TBM women to get them to stick to a religion in which they are second class citizens, and trending down.

Good point.... I often wonder about that myself , not being a

woman who would ever obey a man unless he said something like

"Fire, run"... or something like that.

The TBMs have so much invested into TSCC that regardless of what comes out of the mouths of the first presidency; They will still believe/hope no matter what.

Even if the church admitted everything is a scam/fraud, they will continue to believe.

In listening to my adult children go on about the challenges of having young kids act up in church, it feels like they go out of obligation more than anything else. It just makes me tired listening to them.

I've heard mothers of young kids say they haven't heard a sacrament meeting talk in years. It makes me wonder why they put themselves and their kids through that.

When my kids were small, I wasn't a member of the church so I never went through that. It seems rather pointless to me.

My youngest is a toddler and won't sit still, makes a lot of noise and refuses to go into nursery.

He is the perfect reason for skipping church besides the fact it's all a load of crap.

My eldest son has autism and struggles to read, remember things and needs constant help to learn. Watching him in past primary presentations next to his more accomplished peers was so painful to me. Watching someone stand behind him whispering the words while others read fluently was just an ordeal.

To think of the stress I put us both through when I tried to be a perfect mother and teach him the gospel so he could keep up with the others. Reading scriptures, learning songs, piano lessons, all of which was just beyond him. So much pressure for nothing. No-one misses him as he never had any real friends or adults who took an interest in him.

I love him a lot more now that I am not trying to change him to fit in and I accept him for who he is.

Shame this epithany came when I was out. But at least their will be no mission preasure or stress to get married too young.

Hope, faith, tradition, habit, family solidarity, emotional bond/attachment, duty, commitment, etc. Members attend for a variety of reasons.

I know a TBM woman (now serving a senior mission with her husband) who is quite aware of my ex-Mormon status.

She commented once to me that she had to believe it, because she had lost a son in his late teens, and she "simply could not give up the hope of holding him in her arms again."

That line of thinking kills me. I lost a child 11 years ago, she was 5 months old and likely died from a sleep apnea.

I have felt so much more relief after leaving the church that I WILL be with her again. Because the entire time I was a member after she died, it was nonstop worry that I wasn't doing enough to qualify for the CK where she would be, along with our oldest daughter who is severely disabled.

But once I gave up that belief that there was some unobtainable "heaven", and that if there is an afterlife, surely I would qualify for it, it has helped me immensely in my grieving process.

I think that "hope" may describe it, no matter what religion one belongs to.

I was never a TBM or a TB-anything, although I tried a long line of various religions, including diffo flavors of Christian and Protestant churches, Bahaism, and Buddhism.

I tried so hard to believe, but deep down believed that there was something horribly wrong with me. Why did others have testimonies of their various faiths, but not me.

I think that people do go around in quiet desperation, hoping that the concept of God and and afterlife is true, but not admitting to doubt, lest they be judged harshly by their fellow church-mates or true-believing family members.

But then again, the LDS church, is an all-or-nothing religion. There is no separation of church and state (secular vs. religious life). One's whole life is the church. So therefore the penalty for disbelief is much harsher than most of the moderate mainstream religions that can separate religious life from so-called "normal" everyday living.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/17/2015 02:42PM by Senoritalamanita.

After being a gospel doctrine teacher for many years and trying to get people to give personal experiences. Because I had quite a few as a Mormon.

Very few if any Mormons have actual 'spiritual experiences" (visions, dreams, voices, etc.) other than the 'feeling' experiences they probably get each week when listening to good music, etc. Actually, only 2 in many years as a Mormon that I recall actually seen a spirit or the other had all sorts of warnings (mental impressions I think). I do not count 'feelings' as a spirit experience now I have had hundreds of others and sometimes a good feeling is not right versus a bad feeling is.

So, I believe most Mormons believe out of fear and social pressure when it gets right down to it caused by brain washing. They may call it faith or hope because who wants to admit 'fear' is the reason to continue.

Your family burning for not paying tithing is a pretty strong incentive for someone already brain washed.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/17/2015 09:43PM by spiritist.

I tend to think that two major factors apply here:

Hope and Community

The Church gives people something to hope for - a hereafter where life goes on in some form or another.

Plus

A Community of others. We humans need one another and tend to not like being alone.

Yeah, but then they go and shoot themselves in the foot by taking away all the things that were fun within the community. I assume they are just waiting for the people who remember a chapel janitor, road shows, dances, dance festivals, budget dinners, etc., all of which were relatively inexpensive.

Now pretty much all that's left has to do with indoctrination, like girls camp, EFY and the like.

My TBM wife would tell you she attends church because;

"Wanting to be a worthy member of God's church;"

You're suppose too,

You're instructed too,

She made covenants too,

She feels at peace and spiritually filled when she attends.

Plus, the secondary factors of associating with friends.
So I don't know whether that is hope or faith on her part.

Having it be fun and comfortable... That's what I liked about growing up in the church.

I had an interesting conversation with a Ghanaian woman on leaving a London (UK) Ward @1992. The women said "Africa needs the Church-whether its true or not".What I think she was probably getting at was something like hope and praise for the discipline and the aspirational side to Church culture. In the short to mid-term she may even have had a point. But long-term, once there are African multi-generational family members who start ostracising their kids for their divergent beliefs, it will be easy to see the damaging effects emerging.