As short as I can make it my history in the church goes a bit like this.

Both of my parents are converts, however I, of course, was brought up in the church from the very beginning. I gave talks in church, I attended scouts... I did all that I was told I was supposed to do without question or hesitation. That is until I was about 14. I stopped going to church not because of any doctrinal issue I had, but because I was a teenager and felt I had better things to do - friends, a job, etc.

I was married when I was 20. While she wasn't LDS she wasn't opposed to it either. As such the Bishop in my ward married us. We then continued on just as I had when I was younger. Following the motions that had been prescribed for us. Act this way, believe this, testify of this, attend the temple.

At 28 I was ordained a High Priest and given the calling as 2nd Counselor in the Bishopric. It was only a few months later that the 1st Counselor was released and I was "moved up", if you will. Between 20 and 28 I had served as in the Elders Quorum as a Secretary and Counselor, in the Young Mens presidency as a Counselor and Scout Master and as the Sunday School President.

I am still 28 and I no longer consider myself a member of the LDS church. I have not been excommunicated, but who knows what will come.

There are several things that have lead up to this, but there are two that are pivotal.

1) My wife and I talked openly and honestly. In doing so we discovered that both of us had been simply going through the motions all the while suppressing our concerns for fear that one persons questions my someone adversely affect the others faith or worse, the relationship.

The list of our concerns and "issues" is long and extensive. I won't detail it here because the owner of this site has addressed a good portion of them in his recital of why he isn't a member anymore.

2) I finally realized that I was just "going through the motions" and that I never bothered to do any - for lack of a better phrase - independent research. I was testifying using the words of men I had sustained as prophets, seers and revelators, I was reciting scripture, but never actually looking up the information for myself. I would say "I know the scriptures are true"... because that's what I had heard all my life. But for me I cannot simply pray about a book to determine its worth, especially not when the book in question is the one telling me to pray about it.

But there is so much more, and it relates back to the concerns mentioned in # 1. I became frustrated that instead of investigating my concerns I simply relied on the testimony of others to essentially ignore those issues.

Then, once I did start researching the questions, I found out that I had been keeping myself in the dark my whole life. I truly believe I gave the research its due justice. I didn't just read anti-LDS sites, but also neutral ones, LDS affiliated ones and the actual LDS website as well.

So, where does my family go from here? Well, I'm happy to say that my Father hasn't disowned me or anything (He happens to be the High Priest Group Leader in the Ward), though he does have what I would label as a "typical" response to my issues and the fact that I even have them. As for anyone else, well, "the word" is still spreading, so we'll see. I'm not sure how people take it when a member of the Bishopric up and leaves the church, but I'll shortly find out.

My wife and I have decided to step back and try to take in a bigger picture. What else is out there, what other religion, belief, life style, spirituality or whatever is out there that we can learn something from. Will we join another church, well, we don't intend to. Indeed it's a bit ironic that we feel that the LDS church is in many ways more biblically correct than any other church, but the issues lie in the fact that the LDS church was founded by a liar who in turn added in non biblically correct doctrine. So, we'll take the good things from the LDS church and strive to find truth in other things as we go along.

Many thanks for your interest in reading. I would be very happy to speak with anyone who enjoys intelligent conversation. My email, with out any spaces of course, is jared f stanley at yahoo dot com.

-Jared