previous: Voices from the Dust: March 1996

One of the many pleasures of maintaining a Web page is that it acts like -- and please pardon the phrasing -- a web, drawing in and snaring old friends who have been lost for years. Few of these renewed contacts have moved me as much, however, as the letters from a hometown friend of mine who, as I now know, has had his own misgivings about the L.D.S. church for some time. Though we ate lunch together from time to time in the period when we were each beginning to struggle with the faith, religion was a subject we never once broached in person. I'm glad we've broached it now, and I'm even more glad that my friend has consented to permit me to reprint one of his letters to me below.

March 22, 1996

Dear Bill,

Remember I mentioned that I think my parents suspect my feelings? Well, my dad asked me about it the other day, and I informed him that the Church is not that important to me (trying to soften the blow). He asked why, and without going into detail I told him that there were obvious doctrinal discrepancies and that I never had any conviction greater than the "rightness chills" that I also get at a good movie, play, story (real or fictional), or Paul H. Dunn tale. He wanted to know what I believed and said if I "found something better" I should let him know.

If I may digress, deep down inside I have always felt that I could tell my dad about my beliefs. In fact, I have vague memories from when I was around six or seven of my brother and I taking turns to "get" to stay home from church with Dad. I don't know why this was, but I remember it was short-lived. To an extent, he has always been more open-minded, perhaps from having moved around the country so much. It has always been my mom (perhaps like your dad) that is more guarded and narrow-minded about the whole thing, and I know she would not be able to handle hearing what I believe.

Anyway, my dad told me that, in fact, he too knows there may be discrepancies, but until I find something better I had better stick with it -- the old "play it safe" routine. I wasn't able to tell him -- yet -- that what is actually better is staying away from organized religion altogether. I did not really want to get into it, and I really don't want to tear down what someone else has built a life on, especially my dad -- even though I think we would be a lot closer if we went out and had a beer every now and then. I did tell him that Mormonism's being the only true church is a claim that it has a hard time backing up, and that many people of other religions and beliefs seem to be as righteous and have the same strong convictions as Mormons. I said that if God really wanted the truly righteous, he would not give the these strong convictions to others. My dad said he believed that other religions had part of the truth and that God had not yet revealed the entire truth to the L.D.S. Church, but that the Mormons are currently the only church continuing to have truth revealed. He also said he believed that all these other people would be taken care of.

So, we left it at that for now.

By the way, I believe the same way -- God, whomever or whatever he may be, cannot deny anyone for following their own convictions. As Joseph Smith so eloquently stated at one time, and I paraphrase: "We believe in being allowed to worship God according to the dictates of our own consciences." It's the people who are living a lie and know it that may need to worry.

I am sure that the discussion with my father will continue at a later date. If and when it does, I think I will correspond with him by e-mail, since we live farther apart now and it is easier to explain things without being countered at every statement. When I do, I may feel like sending copies of our correspondence. If you feel like it, you can post it. Just keep it anonymous and discreet for now.

I am curious about how you told your dad. I'm sure you will post it in your apostasy essay, but if you have an advance copy of that part of it -- I believe you said it was letter? -- I think I would like to read it. I don't plan on plagiarizing, as I am not worried about my own convictions, but I am just not a very eloquent purveyor of speech and the moral support would be nice.

If you are interested, I am not just recently disenfranchised by the Church. It's been a slow process, but a continual one for many years now. In fact, I wish I had talked to you more when you were here. I had pretty much felt it was not quite right by then. Following is a brief history.

I never could understand why God played favorites. I had tried and tried to get a testimony, and I think I thought I did a few times. But I discovered long ago that there was nothing special about the "rightness chills" that I felt other people must be getting more of. (I picked that term up from your page, and it is a perfect description of what passes for a testimony.) I remember doing the Enos thing and trying to pray all night -- I actually held out for more than three hours on a couple of occasions -- hoping for some great manifestation of truth.

Around this time, I realized that Alma the Younger didn't even have to ask. He was supposedly out there doing things that would make the Tanners look like stake and Relief Society presidents, and God just decided that he liked Alma anyway so he came down and made sure Alma knew the truth beyond a shadow of a doubt. Now, I was not asking for such a blatant display myself. I just wanted that "something special" that all other members supposedly had, thanks to the Mormons' special friend the Holy Ghost. Never happened.

I kept on "believing" anyway. It was all I knew, and I was playing it safe. I began to realize, however, that people of other religions would also profess the "knowledge" of truth that I thought was only reserved for Mormons. I also thought of all the misguided deeds that have been done in the name of religion because people have had the same type of convictions. "Is this just part of human nature?" I wondered. "Do people just need something to hold onto, and are they able to convince themselves of anything if given the right circumstances?" This alone has caused me to be more open-minded about the whole human experience.

For me, a big factor was back when Mark Hofmann was duping the Church's esteemed, holier-than-thou, what-we-say-goes, direct-channel-to-God Prophet, Seer and Revelator . . . as well as blowing people up. I never have been able to figure out how God wasn't able to just step in and say, "Yo, Spence, Gordon, and the rest of you guys. How's it going? How are the wives? Kids? Good, glad to see everyone's happy. Oh, by the way, this Mark Hofmann guy is bogus. He's fakin' the whole thing and making up those documents. I have to admit he's pretty good, and if he was making that stuff up about other churches I wouldn't worry about it. But since this is my holy Church, I can't go havin' you guys' reputations getting tarnished, so don't go spending my hard-earned tithing income on his documents. I need that money for temples and stuff, you shall be blessed, etc., etc., yada yada." This really went against everything I had ever believed. It seemed to me that even the general authorities weren't getting any more verification of the truth than I was.

Now, people will step in here and say, "You must have faith, and only faith." The Church actually kills itself on this argument, because if it was created on the premise of modern-day revelation and even personal revelation, then faith is not all. We are told that if we seek, we shall know. Also, the fact remains that everything the prophet says is "truth." Were Mark Hofmann's documents actually true until they were declared not true? Whatever.

I started seeing more of these kinds of things going on all over. I guess Satan's got me by the ass now. I have sought out the truth, and I know more than ever that it can't be right.

I was sort of still playing along, having confessed, gotten disfellowshipped, repented, and been restored all in the six months before getting married in the temple -- more because the image of marrying in the Salt Lake temple (an absolutely gorgeous building inside and out) was always the way I pictured my wedding, and I just wanted to have all the pictures and everything there. We actually went back once or twice during our first year, but haven't been back since. Beautiful building, but the ceremony itself -- while being very bizarre and Masonic in nature -- is actually rather boring.

We started out in our new ward, and I got a Church job teaching the fifteen- and sixteen-year-old girls. (It was a regular coed class, but, out of ten kids in the age group, two were boys and only one showed up, so it was essentially a group of girls.) As someone who wrote you earlier mentioned, as a teacher you were supposed to bear your testimony of the principles you just taught. Now, I have not been able to bring myself to bear testimony to the truthfulness of the Church since the early '80s, so this was not any fun.

Fortunately, I got a new job that required I work every few Sundays. I told the bish that I had to work on Sunday more often than I really did, and I got myself released. We had gotten to the point of going to church sparingly, but I was still playing the game for the sake of my parents. When our first baby was born, I actually arranged to bless her myself. (As that great philosopher Tevye said, "Tradition!") This was interesting, because I had to get the paperwork and such from the bishopric when I hadn't been to church for a while, but it went okay.

Since moving to where I live now, I have really gotten out of it. We started out going a little, for the kids, but I have a hard time listening to beliefs that I don't agree with, and I just get frustrated wanting to dispute what everyone says. When my son was born a couple of years ago, however, being the weak person I am, I still had to bless him to satisfy my family. I felt that the whole ward knew I was barely active -- just above inactive, really -- yet I still got the paperwork from the bish. I had to justify going through with the blessing by saying, "He is my son and I am his father, and I will give him a blessing if I want to!" Family pressure can be ugly.

This whole experience was the worst, and it's what gave me the desire find out for sure if the Church had any truth at all, or if I should follow my heart and head and actually back up my feelings with logic. I decided once and for all that some way, somehow, I would figure it out. I felt I knew, but I had to be sure. The more I learned, the more I knew . . . and I actually got depressed and went to a therapist. I told him that I had no belief system and felt lost. As you probably know, it can be very painful with no support system when all you have ever known or believed is reduced to nothing more than a fairy tale. But at the same time, you know that you cannot conscientiously continue to live the lie. To quote an oft-spoken cliche, "You're damned if you do, and you're damned if you don't." But I knew that, if I could get through the initial shock, I would be okay.

This was just as the Internet explosion hit. I had been on AOL and such, but didn't really look for Mormon-related stuff. When I finally got on the Web, I started looking around and found Clint Lauricella's site. Did you ever see that one, Bill? That was the most informative Web site out there. Too bad he was pressured to remove it. Even with all I had gone through, it wasn't until then that I heard about the problems with the Book of Abraham. Boy, was this an eye-opener to me. I guess I never bothered to look into it, but I remembered being told that the papyrus was burned in a fire and that was that. It's surprising that someone who has been a lifetime member of the Church had no idea that not only had the papyrus been found, but it was found nearly thirty years ago! You would think the Church should have these sacred things written by the hand of Abraham himself on prominent display at the Church Office Building as one of their most sacred artifacts. After reading more about them, I can see why it is only whispered about. I personally think that even the most diehard of believers can't totally buy this one. Oh, they may justify it within the realms of their faith, but they can't totally accept it.

(In order to make sure I got both sides of the story, I have read both what Mormons and non-Mormons have written about the papyrus, and I have also reread Abe's book. In my investigations, I have read some apologists who have explained how the facsimiles and text are merely gateways through which Joseph Smith received divine revelations and are not to be taken literally; I've also read that the "real" text is hidden between the lines of what is there. Not only does this refute what Joseph the "Prophet" said about it being in Abraham's own hand, but right at the beginning of the Book of Abraham the writer himself refers to the embalming facsimile as a depiction of Pharaoh's priest attempting to sacrifice Abraham. Pretty good for text and pictures actually drawn thousands of years after Abraham died.)

Enough about the Book of Abe. On the Internet, I also found the old and new temple ceremonies. Having not been to the temple since before 1990, I was unaware of the changes. Because I am very familiar with the earlier version, I can see that a reliable source supplied that text, as it is indeed the ceremony as I remember it. I therefore have no reason to believe that the newer text shown is not what is going on now. I have always been aware of the rumored similarities between Masonry and the temple ceremony, and now through the Internet I was able to verify the similarities for myself. It seems that as the similarities are becoming more known among the general population, the general authorities want to get rid of the most blatant of them. Now let me get this straight -- if this is all based on the early ceremonies from Solomon's days and the Masons just didn't quite get it right, but they did get part of it correct, and Joseph did get it all correct in its original and pure form, then why is it being changed again? And why are the parts that are being changed the same parts that the Masons supposedly got right? Go figure.

Needless to say, Bill, I have pretty much apostatized. Unfortunately, while my wife is not convinced the Church is correct, she is also not convinced it isn't correct. Since it's the only thing she knows, she wants the children raised in the Church so they can decide for themselves. Also, she has made some good friends in our neighborhood and ward and likes the social aspect of it. She thinks it important to go to church as a family and does not like me staying home. I will still go to sacrament meeting every now and then with her and the kids, but I stop there. No Sunday school or priesthood meeting for me. She seems to be starting to want to become a regular Mormon, which is not like the woman I married. I respect that, but I sure do hope either that we can live with our differences or that she learns what I have learned. I've been surprised at the way she has reacted to me as I have become more sure of how the Church can't be true. She seems to use that as a reason to embrace the Church all the more. It is hard to let go and have a lifestyle that you have always known be threatened, whether you really believe in it or not! ("Tradition!")

The bishop called me in to his office for a temple recommend interview last summer. That was when I told him how I felt. I said that I liked the people in the ward, that I wanted to be able to come every now and then with my family, and that I thought that the Church does have its good points -- but that I just couldn't buy the entire concept. I got the normal response -- he bore his testimony to me. I said I respected that he had such a conviction, and I asked if he could respect my convictions. 'Nuff said. He hasn't bothered me since.

But the other day my neighbor the elders quorum president and dropped by with one of his counselors. (I'm sure the other counselor was busy, or I would have gotten triple-teamed.) I was very friendly -- as all good neighbors should be -- and invited them in. After some non-Church-related small talk, they asked me how I felt we could improve the elders quorum. Now get this -- in two and a half years, I have been to the quorum only once! I told him that I was the wrong person to ask, but that maybe we could have a party or something. (Since I've told the bish everything, you know that a whole quorum of other people also know how I feel.)

Well, that's longer than I had planned, and I still left a lot out. It was very therapeutic though -- thanks for indulging me. My therapist mentioned once that I should put my feelings in writing; you gave me a reason and motivation to do that. Thanks a lot, Bill. Seriously, if you ever make it back out here for any reason, let me know. It would be nice to have a long talk. Thanks for your friendship.

Most appreciatively,
X

Though my friend wishes to remain anonymous for the time being, anyone wanting to write to him can email me, and I will forward your message.

next: Voices from the Dust: April 1996