I haven't posted on here in years. After leaving TSCC I briefly tried other religions before deciding I was an atheist. My life isn't working though. Nothing dramatic, I just need more and have really been thinking about returning to Christianity. We all know we can't judge all religion from our experience with the Mormons. What has your experience been like becoming Christian?

I'm all for people having the freedom to believe in whatever they believe in, but how do you go from a believer to an atheist to believer? I really want to know. And when you say your life isn't working out (as an atheist) what does that mean? What does that look like?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/13/2016 08:45PM by wine country girl.

I'm not happy. I'm not progressing in my life. I'm trying everything I know to get better. I'm reading all kinds of books, I'm trying to eat good,I'm exercising, I'm volunteering, I'm trying to meet new people.... I still feel stuff is missing.

Also I think the Mormon church has nothing to do with Jesus. Not in the same way mainstream Christianity is.

wine country girl Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I'm all for people having the freedom to believe
> in whatever they believe in, but how do you go
> from a believer to an atheist to believer? I
> really want to know. And when you say your life
> isn't working out (as an atheist) what does that
> mean? What does that look like?


A forum in which I participate has a former mormon who became an atheist and is now a Catholic.

Is your life not working out BECAUSE you're an atheist?

I'm willing to explore that possibility.

You can still believe in God, prayer, etc. and not become a Christian or join any religion ----- unless you need some 'community'.

I know. I really want the community!

For a good community, if you are stuck between belief systems and non-belief, try the Unitarian Universalists. You can be atheist, Christian, Jewish, Buddhist --- doesn't matter. But you get a nice religiousish service very week, and community with people who do good things. And don't care where you fit in the spectrum of atheist-Christian.

That won't work if what you really want is someone to tell you what to believe and how to practice your belief. Try it out, though, and see if it works for you. If it doesn't, try the Evangelical Lutheran Church or the United Methodist Church or the Episcopalians.

Tried them. Much too progressive for my personality.

I second the notion to give the Episcopalians, ELCA Lutherans, and Methodists a try. The Presbyterians are worth a visit as well. All of those churches are on the moderate to progressive end of Christianity. If you find them too progressive for your taste, then give Catholicism a try.

You can attend any of these churches for as long as you like with no pressure to convert or become a member.

You will find that your experience with other Christian churches will be far less demanding than with Mormonism. You decide how much you wish to donate (2-3% is the average,) and how much time you want to devote to church. You can go for an hour or two each week and call it good. Or, if you wish to volunteer, it will truly be volunteer work and will be accepted with gratitude. You will also receive a lot of services in return for your donations including a professionally trained minister, pastoral counseling, building cleaners and maintenance people, an organist, etc.

I will not recommend it because I haven't been yet but I was told by 'people who appear to believe like me (God, after life, etc.)' that there are 'spiritual centers' where like minded people go. One close (in Utah so undoubtedly in other states) does a weekly meditation time and then a general discussion time.

I plan on going to meet 'like minded people' not necessarily be instructed however that would be fine.

When I left Mormonism in the 90's (with grade school age children,) we picked up and went to other various churches where we lived @ the time on Staten Island.

After trying on several churches to get a flavor of where we fit, and what felt right for my family, we stayed the longest at a Moravian church on the island, until moving to upstate New York after several years there.

The closest Moravian to where we live now was either Toronto or Ithaca. Both were too far to travel weekly. So...we ended up attending the at the time RLDS, it became Community of Christ shortly before we left there around 2001.

I've been the gamut with churches. Having said that...when I was a teenager I went agnostic/inactive (years before I'd leave LDS for good.) During my agnostic couple of years I felt lost and without a rudder.

That's what brought me back into the church at that time, and some powerful manifestations of the spirit that I was being led while not necessarily into Mormonism but away from my unbelief.

In the past few years I've taken to worship at a Jewish synagogue, although I still believe in Jesus as Messiah (note: I am *not* a Messianic Jew.) I'm Jewish through my mum's side, so I didn't need to convert to Judaism. It's been a fairly easy transition for me to make, although I wasn't trained/raised up that way. My Mormon upbringing was a backdrop to the more authentic experience of where I'm at now in my faith walk.

I love Judaic worship, fellowshipping, prayers and my rabbi's sermons. The people are very accepting there, very open minded, tolerant and loving. Quite the opposite of my experience as a Mormon. They accept me where I'm at in my spiritual journey, and I just grow spiritually being around them. They live their religion, and are not empty clanging cymbols.

As an agnostic I used to feel like a lost soul. As a Mormon I used to feel like something was missing from my spiritual center of gravity. Since leaving Mormonism I haven't felt that emptiness since then.

In Jewish worship and practice it is customary to question and not fear wonderment. The questions are more important than the answers. Which is why maybe I feel drawn to that. It embraces the mystery.

Try the Unitarian-Universalists. No doctrinal pressures, you can even remain atheist.

I would recommend another book for you. Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. He was an incredibly gifted, intelligent man, who felt just like you do now. He wanted something more.

Also if you would like to find a church eventually be clear in what you are looking for in a community. You alone can define your relationship with God. No church is able to do that for you. So don't feel pressure to find the "one true church" because that's a silly concept. Find a place you feel safe, valued, and cared for in a genuine way. These places do exist, I promise you.

Tip: look at the way the church treats the members that leave the congregation. That will tell you what you need to know about them.

I think CS Lewis summed it up in Mere Christianity and The Problem of Pain.

You can download the audio books here:
http://www.islandonlinenews.com/cs-lewis.html

I think that The Problem of Pain will give you a good prospective on how to overcome the problems of life.

Bingoe4, there are many folks here on the Board who also struggled feeling rudderless. I have strong empathy for what AmyJo has posted. There are others who have found peace and direction through no belief, some belief, and even living wth the paradox of life--we just don't know.

After many years of self-professed agnosticism, I found myself comfortable with mainline Protestantism. Others may find peace and purpose elsewhere. If my time in Mormonism taught me anything it was to be wary of anyone or anything that claims to have or know the truth. I'm very comfortable discussing faith and disbelief with my friends including those in the clergy. I'm one who chooses to live in the paradox of life.

On your quest, I would like to offer a few suggestions--

1. Choose a community (whether religious or secular) that welcomes all, comprehends all, and enriches all.

2. Look at the leadership that women play in the organization. Are they valued and respected?

3. If it is Christian church does its teachings resonate with the way you understand Jesus's teaching?

4. Can you participate however you wish without being pressured to do more, give more, etc.

Best wishes,
The Boner



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/13/2016 09:40PM by byuboner.

Try golf.

Learning to hate yourself can be therapeutic. Then try to master the game, and yourself, and baby steps seem like monumental changes.

Golf leaves you vulnerable to liking yourself, while hating your limitations.

And when you die, you won't remember anything...

But Shirley, I jest...

elderolddog Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Try golf.
>
> Learning to hate yourself can be therapeutic. Then
> try to master the game, and yourself, and baby
> steps seem like monumental changes.
>
> Golf leaves you vulnerable to liking yourself,
> while hating your limitations.
>
> And when you die, you won't remember anything...
>
> But Shirley, I jest...


Don't call me Shirley!

-Dennis L. "Shirley" Moore

You "decided" you are atheist? Do you actually have a belief in god or not?

I can't just decide I don't believe. I just don't.

I hope you can find the support you are looking for. I hope whatever group you join aligns with your actual beliefs, whatever they are.

It's a big price to swallow a bunch of pap in a church just to fit in with a support group.

Happy searching!

Why is this so surprisng? All of us have changed our beliefs at least once. We decided at some point we didnt believe Mormonism. Some of us decided on other religions and some did not. We could all change again.People change.

Semantics, some of us didn't decide to stop believing. It just happened.

To most, being an atheist isn't a state of mind, it is a state of nature.

If you ever believed and dont now,you have changed your mind. Maybe it was a conscious decision or maybe not.That is not anything to criticize the OP for. His beliefs evolved as did many of ours. I hope he finds what he is looking for whatever it is.I also suggest he take his time,try out some churches and study.Maybe he will find one he likes. Maybe not. Unlike a certain poster,I will not characterize all religious views as pap.

I can honestly say I am the happiest I have ever been, and I say that knowing that I'm not perfect and that I have a very messed up life. Being a Christian dosent make everything ok and better, but it always me to stop thinking about myself, and my hurts, needs, desires, wants......and to focus on others and Jesus alone. It took me a long time to figure it out after Mornonism, because it it so so radically different. Not to mention that myself, just a messed up person, can be open and honest about myself, and I don't have to pretend. I don't have to worry about what other people think, because they are f'ed up too. And I never have to worry about God being angry at me, or that I'm never doing enough.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/14/2016 03:46AM by Susan I/S.

I know from my own experience I've found great peace in the belief that an all knowing, all powerful deity who knows his own future decided to create a species which would act a certain way, then decided to create rules in opposition, then decide to enforce those rules without telling anyone except a small number of middle eastern tribalists who often contradicted each other, then decided to sacrifice himself to himself to appease himself instead of just forgiving the species for doing exactly what he knew they would do before he ever created them.

This certainly satisfied my need for something "more."

It also brings me peace to know that while there are surely parents out there who have built torture chambers in their basements as a way of punishing their children for behaving like children, they're only following the example of their loving creator good jehova.

I mean, as an adult human being I could choose to create my own meaning, or stop feeling entitled to understanding an unfathomable mystery, but nah, I'll just be one more in a long line of gullible fools who perpetuates a sinister belief system that robs children of their power and teaches them they are somehow fallen, and that they can't fix themselves, they need to believe in a middle eastern zombie who must save them from themselves.

Is that what you're looking for to fill that void of yours?

As much as we hate these sorts of labels, I think "changing your religion" should be a true conversion experience. Life events can be precipitating factors to the reexamination of core beliefs, but I'd hesitate hanging my concept of reality based solely on a foundation of my current state of events.

The difference between the atheist and Christian worldview is infinite and irreconcilable. I think many people embrace one or the other due to a significant life event. But ultimately we need to move beyond that life event to see if reality can be reconciled with the world beyond our specific and perhaps temporary initial motivation -- no matter how compelling it may have been. This is the crisis many Mormons face. The "burning in the bosom" experience can be an overwhelming initial evidence for faith, but we're all here because we've learned the reality posed by Mormonism doesn't hold up well in the real world.

In other words, stake your claim on a belief system that you can reasonably explain and fits reality. It doesn't have to answer all of life's questions or completely eliminate all paradoxes -- none will. But you'll have a more stable and satisfying life by embracing a worldview that you can integrate into how the world actually works.

My embrace of Christianity stabilized significantly after spending time as a philosophy major and reading quite a few apologetics. I also try to keep up on writings by those who have rejected it or embrace atheism. For me, Christianity is a real-world faith. An extraordinary event took place in Jerusalem in the first century that resulted in a movement that continues to this day.

There is also an emotional and spiritual element to it that is entirely a personal experience and very satisfying. But that's not something I can hand to someone else as a reason why it's true. But that experience is validated by real world evidences that form a symbiotic experience, and that's a very satisfying place to live.

Advice from a Christian here...visit as many churches as you can and get on their mailing lists. Then spend a year attending only their parties, suppers and receptions. You'll learn a lot.

I caution against turning to a religion or church because it provides fellowship and psychological/emotional comfort. Seek truth, and look for a church which (1) preaches and promotes that as closely as you understand it, and (2) is spiritually healthy (good fellowship, non-manipulative, enriching discipleship and Sunday School). Watch for churches & preachers which promote things like "overcoming your obstacles," success, "power ministry," or other such "personal effectiveness," prosperity gospel, health & wealth, etc. They prey on people's sense of need and insecurity.

Check out more Christian-friendly ex-Mormon boards, too.

Find a good non-KJV study Bible, pick out a book or two and read at a measured pace. (I recommend the ESV Study Bible). There are lots of good on-line daily devotions to consider. Radio Bible Class has several, also a wide variety of articles on doctrine and effective Christian living from an Evangelical/Reformed point of view.

You can get a good feel for most churches from their websites: their statement of faith, schedule for activities, children's and adult programs, etc. If one looks good, call and visit the pastor.

Very importantly, don't expect any church to "make things work" for you. Christianity is no protection against the slings and arrows of the world; it solves some but exacerbates others, and bad things do happen to good people, even us Christians.

Are you dealing with depression, perhaps? The "things aren't working" may be God tweaking you to reconsider Him (He did that to me), it could be something else (problem relationships? work?) and there is no definite formula for figuring that out, unfortunately. Seek Truth, understanding that it is not a panacea for your problems.

John 8:32; John 14.6; John 10:10

Godspeed!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/14/2016 10:33AM by caffiend.

If you think that it might be like-mind community and fellowship that you're looking for, have you thought about trying out one of the Secular Communities that are popping up? As an example, Houston Oasis is sort of in my neck of the woods: http://www.houstonoasis.org

John Dehlin did podcast about these secular communities not too long ago: http://mormonstories.org/oasis-network/

Just a thought... If you've already deconstructed Christianity then maybe something like this might be a better option.

Jay,

So that you know I take your request seriously, I took the time to review your posting history, reading maybe a half dozen or so of your longer messages from each of the last five years. You stopped posting regularly at just about the same time I joined the RFM community as a lurker so we've never interacted on this board before.

XXX

When you post you don't say very much most of the time, and you rarely talk about yourself, so those of us who are eager to be of whatever assistance we can don't have much to go on. But then maybe you just mainly want to listen.

The primary reason I am responding to you is to answer your question "What has your experience been like becoming Christian?" Unfortunately, I may not be the person you're looking for, but I'll let you be the judge of that.

I am in the later part of life; I have never been Mormon. However, I was born multiple generations deep into a works-based religious tradition that originated in America in the early part of the 19th century on the premise that all the many Christian factions could be united by the principle of the Restoration of New Testament Christianity.

By the time I came along in the middle of the 20th century, this tradition had itself devolved into many factions, and mine was an insular group proclaiming themselves to be the One True Church. I can relate to many RFMers who chafed under a religious system of conscript philosophy mixed with phobia indoctrination.

When I had finally had enough and bailed, I did so with the expectation that I would lose my wife, my friends, and my family of origin. There were no kids then. Along the way, I felt my livelihood threatened as from time to time I found myself in a back room with local church leaders reminding me of my obligation to express specific beliefs. Or when they crashed an unauthorized meeting I was attending.

Like Mormonism, we treated orthodoxy as truth, and questioning as dangerous.

Unlike Mormonism, we treated emotions as suspect, and intellect as supreme. That is, as long as that intellectualism came up with the right answers, so, similar to an entire church made up of Mormon apologetics if you can imagine.

It's been a while -- I have adult children who are older now than I was then -- but I do remember quite a lot of detail of my journey from aberrant religion to a listless lostness (which some might call atheism or agnosticism, but I never put a label on it at the time) to Christianity. The Christianity I have embraced is focused far more on individuals than it is on institutions.

I regard the duty of the institution of the Christian church to be to point people to Christ. To know Christ, to love Christ, to follow Christ, to give one's life over to Christ unconditionally. Loyalty to any person or institution is secondary and conditional. To the degree that the institutions of Christianity point people to themselves rather than to Christ, then those institutions have gone astray. My strongly held opinion.

During my period of listlessness I too felt as if my life wasn't working, wasn't progressing. In fact, when I dared to get dangerously honest with myself about myself, I could see a long, slow fade taking place. The ideas my life was built on were not strong enough to hold the weight of my life: the foundation was crumbling, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

One of the most terrifying aspects of this period was the realization that there was no transcendent meaning to my life, indeed no transcendent meaning to all of existence. Some say that we have to create our own meaning. Fair enough. But by the very definition of the word, that self-made meaning can never be transcendent. Ultimately, self-made meaning is simply bluster against the larger context of meaninglessness.

As philosophical desperation set in, I finally relented and decided to show up at a church, even though it was the last place I expected to find answers. Initially, I tried returning to my roots. What a disaster! Nothing had changed there, so I quickly moved on.

In May 1991 I attended a weekend service of what some people regard to be the original mega-church, at least in America. It was almost like going to the theater; it was about 95% presentation and 5% participation. The presentation was creative and compelling, easy to understand, extra-ordinarily straightforward.

Except I now had trust issues, and spent an entire year returning each week for more of the creative/compelling part while at the same time watching intently for the hidden agenda to appear. Right at the one year mark, their relentless integrity finally broke through my hardened defenses. Or more accurately, my defenses softened as I slowly realized that this church was above board: what you see is what you get.

And my heart melted into a puddle -- hard to imagine since I was a seriously jaded businessman in a major rough-and-tumble metro at the time -- when I finally grasped the message of grace, a message I had never been taught in my upbringing.

All this time I had been carrying an intense anger that resided so deep I didn't even know it was there. That is, I should have known, since it would erupt from time to time, but in the most unexpected times and places. No rhyme, no reason. As it turns out, that's the nature of buried problems.

That was nearly 25 years ago. Today, literally THIS DAY, I showed up for the first time at a church that meets at the elementary school across the street from my house. The church my family and I have been attending has served us very well in critical ways for several years, but it's just so darned far across town. It's not our community. So now I'm scouting around for a group meeting nearby.

What am I looking for? Proximity, yes, but what else? A place to know and be known; a place to serve and be served; a place to love and be loved; a place to learn and teach; a place to extend and receive grace. A place to *BE* the church among others who are also being the church.

So much more to say, but I'm out of time. Maybe this bit of personal history will help you, maybe not. Either way, it's yours, for free.

A few extra thoughts:

You use the phrase "thinking about returning to Christianity" which in combination with the fact that you were a convert to Mormonism raises the question of what relationship you had to Christianity before becoming Mormon.

As for your statement "We all know we can't judge all religion from our experience with the Mormons" that has not been my experience of some of the people who post here on RFM. But I'm glad to hear you say it.

For more stories of people who were Mormon and became Christian, I suggest you look up the Ex Mormon Files with 'Bishop' Earl.

Regards,

JAR



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/14/2016 05:10PM by Maude.

If you are willing, and you can afford it, I suggest a few sessions with a therapist, specifically a Christian therapist who can help you clarify why you feel the way you do.

Caffiend said it best:

Very importantly, don't expect any church to "make things work" for you. Christianity is no protection against the slings and arrows of the world; it solves some but exacerbates others, and bad things do happen to good people, even us Christians.