For some of you who don't know me, I have a friend who joined the church. She hasn't even hit her 2 year mark and today, she told me she was done with the church and that she was leaving.

This came as quite a bit of a shock to me and our mutual friends who have formally resigned or are non-believers who are inactive in the church. This was a person we had trouble getting through to no matter what we tried to do, so ultimately, we were going to let her realize it for herself and just bet on when her shelf would crack.

When she phoned me today, I was taken aback. But on a happy note, she realized the truth a few weeks ago when a few of her exmormon friends reached out to her to confide and talk with her. It took this to get her researching and reading. What cracked her shelf ultimately was that "Brother Joe" (as she now calls him) married other men's wives behind their backs after he sent them on missions for the church and the fact that he married a 14 year old girl. One of her closests friends from university is still teaching sociology at her alma mater had a talk with her about how a 14 year old girl in Joseph Smith's time is the same as a 10 year old in today's time, so Joseph Smith practically married a girl who is in today's time a 10 year old. That enraged her and made her blood boil. She also discovered how the polygamy doctrine still exists in the D&C so now she believes Utah gave in to the U.S. government to rid of polygamy in order to obtain statehood - "the church isn't as strong in its faith as it leads people to believe."

Oh, there were other things she mentioned that knocked her off her feet and made her see the light, but the marrying a 14 year old and bigamy-womanizing marriage part rocked her to her core.
Originally, she had planned to exit in her own way, but that didn't happen. She had a Mormon friend who use to live in the same neighborhood as her and she met his non-Mormon girlfriend a the bishop's home for a social event. She took down her email and sent her an email laying out the history of the church and how the church apparently believed Jesus needed a mall with a retractable roof and that the Presidency should spend $1 Billion in tithing money to build it (another big one for her). His girlfriend forwarded the email to the bishop and that's what landed her in her bishop's office today. The talk went well and she's not upset by any of it.

She is angry and feels cheated. I never would have guessed she would see it this quickly given the past couple of weeks she seemed the same old person to me. Better now than later.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/02/2018 07:34PM by helenm.

Converts are leaving faster now than ever before. In my day, people that thought they had had the experience of the Holy Ghost whispering to them that the BoM and the LDS church is true tended to stay caught up in it for ten years or more before they figured out the truth. Thank God for the information age! I would have left many years earlier if I had had access to the information.

I was in a state of shock for a couple of weeks after discovering the truth. Next came the anger stage,which lasted about two years. But I was in for many years--maybe with two years in it won't be as bad.

It might help her to know that it was nothing personal. They only wanted her money. Cults and cult thinking. All of the reasonable people are leaving, so eventually only the crazies will remain. It should accelerate once church really starts to suck.

I think what happened historically is that lying to protect the institution was normalized. The truths that could have prevented decay were suppressed. Religion can be good, but definitely not Mormon style.

I think she will be okay. She didnt even hit her two year mark so she will be able to put this behind her and move on with no problem. I am happy she finally sees the light.