NOM

I think we can separate out religion into three distinct roles: 1 - It provides a common ritual 2 - It provides a community of common belief 3 - It provides a conduit for its membership to spirituality In saying this, I consider spirituality to be a moment of intense positive emotion sometimes accom...

I have had very similar experiences. In-crowd vs. out-crowd humor. People who previously had senses of humor when I was a believer suddenly do not. A while back a group of us were chatting and someone mentioned a man in our city who has his medical license stripped because he was molesting patients....

I started keeping a journal about six months prior to my mission and six months after my mission. They present an image of a young man who was crushed by his religion. My early journal describes my love of life, my excitement to serve, and an unbeatable spirit. My sinful past was behind me and I was...

Like all things in life it is shades of gray. I do not think that someone should be involved with a charitable organization built on donations and become wealthy. Likewise, I do not think that someone should be involved professionally with a charitable organization built on donations and not be comp...

My co-parent and I both agree that we would probably still be married if we had remained active LDS. I've thought about this a lot over the years since my separation and divorce, and here are my insights as to why: First, when we were fully active LDS we had one massive commonality between us: Mormo...

Side note: I still have guilt to this day that we excluded my then-wife's family from our marriage. When we were engaged, my mother-in-law asked me if we would have a ring ceremony and my believing self thought that it would diminish the importance of the temple. My finance agreed and our marriage h...

This article brought out one of my greatest frustrations with dealing with Mormons and Mormonism. They do something, they teach something, and when it is brought to the attention of others, they try to convince everyone that what they are seeing is actually the opposite. My favorite example of this ...

We all hopefully had a mentor when we were in our formative years. Mine was a 40-something computer programmer who took me under his wing while I worked my way (as a programmer) through college. Not only did he help me in my career immensely, but he also helped me shape who I am as a person. I had l...

It was interesting seeing how my current church handled our divorce. We were treated separately and the church itself stayed as far away from divorce as possible. They saw to spiritual needs and asked both parties if there were issues and whether one person would be willing to go another parish near...

Despite my avatar, I am male.

Thank you for this post. I wrote up a long post about my parents' divorce, but I realized short and sweet is better. My father was very abusive and charismatic. When they divorced my father turned the ward against my mother which was emotionally abusive and in a few cases, physically dangerous for h...

A little over a week ago I was approached by two young men in the park. They were not Mormon missionaries as they were both wearing tank tops and one was sporting quite the impressive beard for such a young man. They were evangelicals asking if I embraced both Jesus Christ as the sole Lord and Savio...

This thread is fascinating. I've always been aware of gender-based condescension because I had "feminine" interests as a child and teenager (ballet, classical music, art, etc.). I still regret to this day avoiding my dream of being a cheerleader in high school because it was associated with the othe...

Still not as creepy as Ben Carson's commissioned art work he has hanging in his bathroom.

It's always good to catch up with friends who are musicians. (If you like music, you are my friend, if you don't, heck your still probably my friend.) Running sounds cool. Are you still gigging on organ at the Episcopal Church? I've done depression, divorce, and the shelf-break myself. There is sti...

Hi, everyone. A few people reached out to me to check up on me recently, and I really appreciate it. I have been incredibly busy at work and home recently and have had very little Internet time. Add to it that I'm in a really good place right now in life (which hasn't changed much in the past year o...

I was just thinking about this and I remembered something funny when I was endowed. My best friend told me before I went through the temple to "duck when the monkey comes out with a hammer". I knew he was joking and we both laughed. Later in the conversation he said something like (paraphrasing): "S...

I have always said (even as a believer) that Joseph Smith deserved to be jailed, tried, and put in prison for his blatant abuse of power and destruction of a printing press while in position of power in the government. However, he should not have been killed. That idea was always unpopular as a beli...

I didn't crack up. I just saw it as liturgical garb. HOWEVER, I did lose a friend during lunch a few years ago. They made fun of a Bishop's Mitre (pointy hat), called it stupid, and I busted out laughing. I can't recall exactly what I said but it was along the lines of, "How can a pointy hat be so s...

I like Mormon Doctrine . As a Mormon, I disagreed heavily with McConkie's teachings and his approach to doctrine. BUT, I liked the fact that he wasn't ashamed of his religion. Much of my experience as a Mormon (and my experiences engaging with Mormons after leaving) is that many Mormons are ashamed ...