A common complaint for many who leave the church is that critical information was hidden. Church history is whitewashed and made faith-promoting at the expense of honesty. I myself didn't know Joseph Smith practiced polygamy until I was 40 years old. Likewise it wasn't until I left the church that I learned the BofA papyri had been recovered. I grew up in Utah but never once heard the real story about the MMM. Anti-Banking society? What was that? Handcarts were deliberately made from inferior woods? Really? Blood atonement? Adam/God? The list seems almost infinite.

When the apologists respond to the whitewash criticism it seems like their first defense is to blame the victim. “We don't hide this stuff! It's all there in the library! I knew all this stuff! It's not the church's fault that you didn't spend the time to research the real history of the church!”

OK, fair enough. The information is all there and I eventually found it. I might have left the church 20 years sooner and saved thousands in tithing, but I'm out now and that's good enough. But why didn't I do the research sooner?

BECAUSE THE CHURCH IS MIND CRUSHINGLY BORING!

I remember going to primary as a 4 year old and already knowing the answers. The teacher would ask and I'd have the answer. Not because I was particularly smart, but because we were spoon-fed everything. That was the pattern for the next 35 years of my church education. Brain-dead answers to Brain-dead questions. I couldn't even make it through Seminary as a high school student because church stuff sucked the life out of me. The idea of going to the library just to look up more boring church crap was out of the question! I'd have preferred my ass be sanded with an 80 grit belt sander then soaked in Tabasco sauce.

The religion classes at BYU, everything at the MTC, every Gospel Doctrine class I ever sat through, they were all the same: BORING, Oh sure, once in a while there was a teacher who tried to spice things up with little tidbits about life in the ancient world. Isn't it interesting that blah, blah and more blah? In the end the lessons always came down to Pray, Pay and Obey and left me feeling trapped.

I never enjoyed going to church. It was always a giant pain it the ass but I felt I had to endure, so I did. Year after year I'd trudge through Sunday and put it behind me as fast as I could. The idea of spending my non church time doing research about the church was a complete non-starter. Why would I torture myself like that?

Stunted

AMEN!

I didn't know much about the padded history until I came here.

What ALWAYS nagged me and motivated me for answers was the blacks and priesthood rubbish.

So by default I kept seeking.

Finally upon really reading the Bible, that question got answered.

Now the only problem was a whole slew of questions arose about MORMON doctrine and I was like okay

Suddenly the weight just came off!

Well put stunted. Don't forget how they command you not to look at anything "anti-church" aka the TRUE CHURCH HISTORY". I guess part of me never looked not just because they told me it was wrong to do so but deep inside I think that I knew what I read would sway me. I wish I had like you said years of boring wasted time and thousands and thousands of dollars.

> When the apologists respond to the whitewash
> criticism it seems like their first defense is to
> blame the victim. “We don't hide this stuff!
> It's all there in the library! I knew all this
> stuff! It's not the church's fault that you
> didn't spend the time to research the real history
> of the church!”
>


This reminds me of an excellent exchange from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:


"But Mr Dent, the plans have been available in the local planning office for the last nine months."

"Oh yes, well as soon as I heard I went straight round to see them, yesterday afternoon. You hadn't exactly gone out of your way to call attention to them, had you? I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything."

"But the plans were on display ..."

"On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them."

"That's the display department."

"With a flashlight."

"Ah, well the lights had probably gone."

"So had the stairs."

"But look, you found the notice didn't you?"

"Yes," said Arthur, "yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'."

I loved that book. The Vogon poetry was still much better than any General Conference address I ever listened to.

When I asked myself the question,"Why didn't I study this out sooner," I finally realized that it was because I simply didn't care enough to know. I wasn't interested in church history or mormon doctrine, especially the white washed stuff. I always chose to study other things, a thousand other things, like maybe reading through the entire instruction manual for the vacuum cleaner.

Mormony stuff made my head hurt.

Now, the real church history is shit full of drama, betrayal, murder... THAT's interesting.

I was actively discouraged from asking too many questions or looking at the wrong materials.

Don't feel bad for your ignorance. Looking back, I wonder how I attended church year after year after year after year . . . and didn't look hard at the real stuff until the last fhree years with help of the Intrnet and the "Mormon" "Curtain" et al.

I was still terrified the first time I googled for information on the endowment's similarities to Masonry. If I had to go the library for that kind of information I'd probably still be stuck in the cult.

I've said before that it was completely life experience that got me out. All the rest if just icing on the cake. I did know about JS and polygamy (I read some book about it--by a mormon author--actually a good mormon friend of mine had me read it). I also had read some of the Gerald Lund series.

As my exmo therapist says--"We tested mormonism to its limits and it failed both of us." It sure failed me--and all the voices screaming in my head telling me there was something wrong with this picture finally won out.

BUT I've been thinking about this very issue recently because my TBM sister (who I no longer speak to) left on a 3 week vacation driving back to the East Coast and stopping at mormon historical sites. NEVER in my most TBM days (and I was more TBM than she or her husband at one time)--did I ever consider going to church historic sites on vacation. I hated going to temple square or this is the place OR even pioneer village. The Lion House--that candy sure was a disappointment. My relatives would come from out of state and it was all mormon history. I didn't even go to temple dedications EVER because I didn't want to sit through ONE MORE BORING MEETING.

I went because I thought I had to. No other reason.