Posted by:
Stunted
(
)
Date: June 13, 2011 04:28PM
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