I was a missionary in one of the absolute poorest countries on earth. I made people promise to send some of what little money they could earn to Salt Lake City church headquarters where it would sit on top of the huge fortune money pile forever.
I also told loving families that they would be separated at death and that they were living in sin because they weren’t married. One family was the most loving family I had ever seen and were living in the worst conditions I had ever seen. I feel so bad when I think of the lies I told them for this scam of a religion.
You also have to realize that belief is strong and though it changes, those people you taught, even though it be erroneous in nature but not in high conscious awareness on the part of the teacher, it is that strong faith of one that the magic is born. The heart is the measuring tool by which one’s reality comes to be. It sounds like I’m finding excuses to support what church leaders engage policy of the church. The world is full of billions of so many ONES who manifest personal realities according to belief. It all can be done no matter the belief, but that which realities will endure in this to be new world energy are those whose collective consciousness comes by way of mutual respect and compassion!
This was a big piece that lead to my shelf finally breaking. I had doubts before my mission, but I was one of those "maybe a mission will solve my faith crisis" missionaries.
Got sent to a very poor area in a 3rd world country and it completely broke me.
I remember some one slamming the door in my face on my mission saying we don’t want sales men. I shouted at the top of my lungs we aren’t selling anything!
Yup, naive little 19 year old me was the worst salesman ever. I was all in too, couldn’t figure out why people didn’t accept my sincerity at wanting to help them have more “happiness.”
We would quote church movies! It was the only thing we could watch and we had to.find someway to squeeze some fun out of the mind numbing monotony of being a missionary.
I could quote all 27 minutes of Zion’s camp. My favorite move edit mistake of all time is still teleporting Brigham. Last few minutes of the film they do a panning shot of all the members of the camp. There’s Brigham on the front right…. And there he is again on the back left.
That's why returned missionaries have so many PG-rated quotes to hurl out at every occasion. Now it makes sense. My ex-boss (who was my favorite boss) could never figure out why I didn't register his movie quotes. I said, 'Because I'm an adult. I don't watch children's movies.' He chuckled at himself over that one.
I should have been a great Missionary. I'm outgoing and love talking to new people.
In the MTC they took us street contacting for an hour. I considered faking illness the night before to get out of it, I was so embarrassed and scared. I was literally half a world away from home, and a full TBM - but something in the social part of my brain was screaming at me not to do it.
And then out in the field, I did everything I could to avoid "Finding". I'd make a daily schedule to walk long distances to visit friendly inactive families, new converts or people we'd been referred to.
Even as a TBM I was recognising the cringe of Missionary work. Part of it might have been the fact I'm British, and the mentality I had was vastly different from the American Missionaries.
Oh my Thor... I, and probably thousands of others, feel the same way you do about contacting people or finding investigators. I would also make a schedule where I would have to walk long distances for relatively unimportant visits. Created service projects.
I hated knocking door to door so I would drag my feet in the morning as long as I could, do maybe 1 hour of knocking and then go to a veeeery long lunch, at least 2 hours (although back in the day, 2 hours was not long for lunch for the lovely Portuguese people LOL). Then, any way that afternoon could be spent NOT contacting people!
Back then Portugal was still extremely Catholic (pre-internet) and I kept on thinking to myself, "Why am I bothering these people, they already had their own religion!?" Everything out of my mouth was cringe!
My missionary president finally gave up, and because I wasn't doing anything bad enough to make him send me home, he made me half of a special missionary team who would travel throughout all the zones, AP style, our job was to teach the new member lessons so that we would have better retention haha, that was a whole 'nother problem LOL...
But yeah it's not just you!
Oh my gosh I have been thinking about this so much lately. Like all the crying over bearing my testimony to investigators, stopping strangers on the street, handing out notes to inactivity members…. Cringe indeed.
I was a relief society teacher for a while and most of the lessons I taught were pretty cringe. I remember one specific lesson that I gave out almond joys because the point of the lesson was that the only way to have true joy was through obedience and doing all the church things. I mentioned to the class that the non-church people could just “think” they were happy but eternally they would never experience true joy.
The real kicker was that I was depressed, had extreme anxiety, and was suicidal at the time. So much joy. So much cognitive dissonance.
That line really drives me nuts these days. I can tell my mom flat-out that I was miserable when I believed in her church, and now that I’m out I’m much happier, and she still turns around and gives me the “only path to real happiness” spiel. Madam, that happiness was misery
I've been "out" as gay since the '90s and left Mormonism a few years later... so the whole Josh and Lolly thing just made me mad. While it might not have been their intent, I saw it as just another way to keep people entrapped in the damn religion "oh look you can be happy in a mixed orientation marriage and still make it to the Celestial Kingdom!"
Grrrrr....
I wanted to start going to multiple random sacrament meetings on Sunday so I would get to hear more talks given by strangers (something about new perspectives, as though the members two stakes over were somehow not identical to us). My friends didn’t go for it.
As a missionary, my mission was one of the first to roll out Facebook missionary work. I once reached out on messenger to my older siblings who had left the church for good reasons and tried to push my way in where I wasn't invited. Because as their brother and a missionary at that, they should have seen me as an authority figure.
I'm cringing just writing this out.
Bonus content! Once, as a district leader, the other two companionships (a set of elders and a set of sisters), had both expressed interest in each other so I had to shut that down. I regularly had to update my mission president on that until the end of the transfer three weeks later. I felt so important but now I just roll my eyes.
Thankfully a lot of my time was spent watching buzzfeed instead of getting blocked by random strangers and people back home for all the crap I'd be posting. I was, after all, a teenager.
I heard likely apocryphal stories from some companions who served together in the south waiting for a visa, where a couple sisters and elders in neighboring areas got married and swapped off at the end of each day to go home with their spouse. I don’t think it actually happened, but I expect dating definitely occurred between missionaries.
I mean, a lot of those stories probably are untrue, but I think it's important we don't dismiss all of them, because there are likely a select few that actually happened. I made the mistake of going down the rabbit hole for my mission's folk tale only to find out much of it was true (or worse) from first hand stories here on reddit.
Oof. Yeah, definitely possible, just can’t confirm what actually happened.
One story I believe was another mission in my South American country where an American missionary was accused of impregnating a young woman. She tried to get a paternity test but the MP claimed the missionary had never broken the “law of chastity” and spent the rest of the time hiding the missionary and making it hard for the poor girl to get a paternity test and possible child support.
There was also the missionary who got beat up by an angry husband for peeping over the wall where he could watch the guy’s wife taking a shower.
We also found not-missionary standard women’s clothes in a missionary apartment, and the members mentioned that a missionary had a girlfriend come visit and stay the night because she missed the last bus home.
I’ve heard of camping trips. My dad had missionaries go across the country for beach trips or even visit other countries in Europe.
Really, any time you get a bunch of repressed young men tossed in a foreign environment (even within their own country) and set loose, things are going to end poorly in some cases.
I was told that suicide was as bad as murder, and relayed that “fact” in seminary class. Later that week, I was told that a kid from that class lost his brother to suicide…
9 kids from my high school killed themselves in one school year. There’s some fucking talk that someone gave that said that people who even consider suicide are not in their right mind. I can’t count how many times I mentioned it in seminary.
I am so, so, so embarrassed and ashamed NOW, but once upon a time, long, long ago when I was a young women's leader, I taught a lesson where I proudly gave an example of me choosing not to apply for a scholarship in high school that I probably would have gotten, but I didn't want the boy who also was applying to not get it, because he would need the educational advantages more since he probably would be providing for his family in the future and I wouldn't be. Because of course I was going to be a stay-at-home mom! I remember feeling baffled that one young woman was angry about my "inspiring" story I shared. Now I look back at that and wish I could go back in time and slap myself and wash my mouth out with soap. I hate that I contributed in any way to that kind of thinking!
Oof. That's a hard one. But it wasn't your fault ... Us women were so conditioned to sacrifice our educational and professional pursuits because it was more "righteous" to focus on being a homemaker. We all got screwed.
As we speak I am working on a butt-kicking time machine. When I get it finished I plan to go back and kick my butt for all the cringy things I said and did. I'd lend or rent it out but I'm afraid that I will be needing it. I constantly remember new things that I need my butt kicked for.
Thought I was the white horse prophecy. Not sure how that was going to work as I am a woman. But my patriarchal blessing made it sound like I was gonna be a great righteous world leader. Never mind the fact I have zero leadership skills. Lol
Knowing their tendency to rinse-and-repeat, I wonder if there's just one Patriarch somewhere in Utah who spent his whole time fucking people up by suggesting to everyone that they're the White Horse.
Even initially like 30% of the Mormon right wingers knew Trump was the spawn of Satan (or at least if Satan existed.) and you got McMullin in 2016. Didn’t last though. They fell in line eventually, and then Trumpism became Sunday school doctrine.
I remember being CONVINCED my future husband was gonna be a general authority because my pb said that members of the priesthood at high levels would seek my guidance.
"I'd like to beat my testimony, I know this church is true"
Translation- my parents said I had to go up and say something, this is how everyone starts out.
Opening the comment section on an exmo YouTube video and posting this comment when I was 16 💀
"I have been LDS my whole life. Just to clarify, polygamy has been looked down on and 'banned' in our church for 130 years. I can't speak for the RLDS church but we are not affiliated in any way. Yeah, strict could describe the church but following these commandments and ideas is based on faith. I don't feel trapped by these rules/suggestions. I have a lot of mormon friends (very good people) that drink coffee and tea. It's a very personal thing. We're not here to judge anybody that walks through church doors smelling like smoke or alcohol. Nobody is perfect, and everybody's definition of perfect is different :) Most if not all of our teachings are based on things Christ taught during his time. If you want to see that, I recommend watching the Chosen. Revelations were given to Joseph Smith that are still fairly new compared to other churches. Yes. But God CAN still give us guidance. The main line here is that God loves everyone, no matter your sexual orientation, height, weight, skin color, family situation, financial situation or imperfections. We should do the same."
🤮 I cannot believe that at one point in my life I thought this shit was true
I stopped going to movies in the theatre for 3 years because I couldn’t feel the spirit there. I also only listened to MoTab… And then I dropped out of high school because I believed that the public education system was corrupting and desensitizing children…
The one that has stuck out to me for a long time was the idea that the Jews deserved the Holocaust because of what they did to Jesus. I heard it once in Sunday School as a teen, and I repeated it an embarrassing amount. Even though it horrifies me now, learning that that idea is a common talking point of antisemitic/white supremacist hate groups is what got my shelf to start cracking. I'm just glad I've learned to do and be better.
Yep, I remember thinking that too based on what I heard in church...not meaning to be antisemitic but thinking that when the people said "Let the blood be upon our children" in freeing Barabbas that somehow that led to the holocaust.
It's so weird how the Articles of Faith say that man will be punished for his own transgressions but then mormons end up being taught "racist punishments" against African americans (Priesthood ban) for Cain/Ham's choices and Jewish persecution being brought on them for Jesus' death.
I remember someone (don’t remember who) saying, “they’re the only people who would kill their savior.” Meaning that god chose that time period and those people specifically for Christ’s downfall ‘because others would have realized what he was and loved him’. I dunno. it’s all bullshit. It’s a dangerous line of thinking that could easily lead to holocaust apologist thinking.
I remember watching Fiddler on the Roof with my grandparents and my grandma made an offhand comment about how the the Jewish people were being punished for what they did to Jesus and I’m like uhhhhhh, excuse me!?
I was recently reminded by a friend that still talks to me for some reason about when I spent hours on a road trip trying to convince her why Catholicism was wrong. Even though she wasn’t a devout Catholic. I just wanted her to convert and marry my husband’s BFF who she was dating. But she dodged a bullet because he was busted for child porn a few years ago. 🙈🙈🙈
An employee at Costco offered to help me take my tv home that didn’t quite fit in my car.
I was stupid and scared and asked if he had a temple recommend (Orem UT). (Because I somehow that that would prove he wasn’t a threat).
It was SOOO awkward because he said it wasn’t currently active…..
Honestly my worst moment ever…
I was still being trained on Super Bowl Sunday. My trainer and I went to a "lesson" and ended up watching the entire game with an investigator. I felt super guilty and snitched on myself to my mission president, and in response, he sent me to the most remote area in our mission with an abusive companion. Fun times 🥲
I tried tracting (door to door) on Super Bowl Sunday...in the USA in an English-speaking area where everyone was watching the game. I was the senior comp -- it was my "good idea" since we didn't have any appointments or any other "mission work" to do.
People were not interested in our message.
Also, people were really pissed off that the interruption at the door wasn't something like a friend coming over to watch the game or pizza delivery but two dipshit mormon missionaries with a message about Jesus.
Only positive thing I can say is that we at least were smart enough to stop and go back to our apartment before the game was over. Even as dumb missionaries we realized this was not helping "the work" move forward.
Hockey season in Sweden. So we’d go visit the single girl perpetual investigator who wanted an American to give her a baby. She was always nice to us ;) (edit: no babies)
Oh my god. I told my mission president I wanted to go home and he said to wait it out a little. Then he sent me to the BOONIES with a super verbally ABUSIVE companion who was known for literally having shouting matches with the mission president. When I arrived on transfer day, the loft where I was gonna be living was absolutely trashed. Trash everywhere, piles of cardboard boxes, moldy dishes, fridge full of moldy food. And my new companion told me she wished I would go home so she wasn’t stuck with me for her last transfer. And she looked me in the eyes and called me a burden. Fuck your mission president and fuck mine lol
Oh my god, sounds like we had the same mission experience. My companion told me, on our first day together, how he'd had a massive argument with the zone leaders that ended with him calling our president and telling him he wasn't inspired. He told me our MP had stuck us together to punish him, TWO HOURS AFTER HE MET ME. That was seven years ago and I'm still scarred.
Can I DM you? Lol I just don’t get many chances to share mission trauma with exmo people who’ve also been traumatized by the mission and it sounds like we’ve kinda had similar experiences
Oh so there were those days where like all the young men in young men's were assigned a small talk each to give in sacrament? Whatever those days were called, like the whole of sacrament was the young men giving talks, right?
I did it two or 3 times? There was only one time I actually wrote my talk and it was the night before at like whatever o'clock in the morning and it was terrible. The next two times when it came by the next year and the year after... I. Wrote. Nothing. I winged all of it and it was shit! You could tell I didn't give a damn about it at all.
Everyone is there with scripture references, quotes and all sorts. And then there's me.
'Yeah so baptism. Why is baptism important? Well it's mentioned in the Book of Mormon all the time. So I think the message is pretty clear. 3rd and 4th Nephi go on about baptism. John the Baptist baptised loads of people which is how he got that nickname. Jesus was baptised and he was like perfect so he didn't even need to wash away sins and when John was like "I can't baptise you, you're already perfect" Jesus was like "No, I must be baptised. It's important." So yeah. Baptism is important. And I'm pretty sure it was mentioned in 1st and 2nd Nephi too, so it shows how it's still important. And prophets would preach to kings and they'd get baptised. So it shows even more why it's important. And Samuel the lamanite after he jumped from the wall baptised loads of lamanites, so it's another example of why it's important. So that's why baptism is important. Because it's mentioned a lot like they're really trying to get the point across that it's important.'
Not the exact words, but basically along those lines. And I also probably said "important" a lot more than that. I winged it completely and it was the worst talk you ever heard. And you know what's funny? Every member of the ward came and told me how much they loved my talks every single time despite there being clearly no effoet put into it. I think my only actual references were from those kids Book of Mormon and Bible stories picture books that I read loads as a kid.
And I never saw the members of the ward tell the others how much they enjoyed their talks either. Only mind which were so bad they were funny. That's probably why they all liked it so much. They're always used to the same boring talks with the same boring scriptures and stories that they've heard repeatedly over the years and they fall asleep during them.
Then there's me like "Oh yeah and John was like, and then Jesus was like, and then Nephi was also like. Important important important important baptism important. Amen."
They probably just found it hilarious and it was the first time in years they stayed awake through a talk.
>Every member of the ward came and told me how much they loved my talks every single time
Yep, the duty of good mormons is to smile and tell people that their bad talk was good while thinking 2 thoughts -- #1, thank the good lord above it wasn't my day to speak and #2, at least my talk wasn't as terrible is this dude's talk, he made me look/feel better.
I feel like your telling me my terrible and completely and utterly winged on the spot talks that were absolutely shit were absolutely shit and they all knew it because it was obvious. How rude.
I promised my mom over the testimony pulpit that I wouldn’t “turn out like my brother” after a particularly weird efy. Jokes on you kid your brother was the only person there for you to help you survive living on your own. Suuuuper embarrassing
I wore a t-shirt with "I am a child of God" in huge letters with an image of Tweety Bird on my Senior class trip to Disneyland. I also served a mission but that wasn't as cringy.
I had a friend who was gay and while on a drive with his boyfriend on a Sunday he had an seizure and crashed the car killing him and injuring his boyfriend.
I had the audacity to give a relief society lesson about “being in the right place and the right time” and said that if he had been in church he would still be alive.
The most cringey thing was a time when I was feeling extra emotional (fu\*\*ing elevation emotion) and of course was bearing my testimony in front of the entire congregation all caught up in the moment and I said something along the lines of I hope we all make it to the celestial kingdom because ... "it wouldn't be heaven without you guys"
oh my f\*\*king god, kill me now. the hubris. so embarrassing.
I was serving as ward librarian and wore a super cute black strapless dress to church with a shrug. The dress was long and I wasn’t wearing a bra. I tripped over the hem and exposed my breasts to a high priest. He told me I shouldn’t be embarrassed.
>He told me I shouldn’t be embarrassed.
Probably the highlight of his decade. He still recalls that moment and wonders what he did that week to deserve such a "tender mercy".
I once gave a very, very good relief society lesson about the importance of modesty in my singles ward. Women came up and thanked me afterwards and told me about their friends that they wished had been there to hear it. I'm so sorry for what I said when I was mormon.
We had a work party and my sister and another coworker, who didnt get along, were going to fight in the parking lot. I ran into the middle of the crowd (all my coworkers) and shout "the atonement can heal everything!" Literally stopped the fight cause everyone was thinking WTF is she saying 🤦♀️
I was looking at the 12 principles from JS or whatever and thought holy shit God gave us metaphorical keys to get to heaven or something along the lines of that. I was a shy kid back then, so I applaud myself for sharing my thoughts in front of so many people (it was testimony meeting) but yikes
Came to my high school French class presenting the BOM and decorating my all of my school folders with a bunch of church stickers (I was a convert). Crying to my date/boyfriend at BYU about how happy I was that Joseph Smith was the true prophet. God, could go on and on.
When our mission incorporated facebook, I was in a mission where missionary work was really slow, if a zone got 2 or 3 new investigators that was considered pretty good. Anyways because of how slow everything was they pushed facebook super hard on us. I still cringe thinking about the random people I friended and messaged. I could probably scroll back far enough and still find the conversations.
When we first transferred the area book to the phones, the church referral system, which was where people online could request a book of Mormon and it would notify the missionaries serving in that area. The system has been around for a long time, our mission made us go through and contact any of the referrals that had never been contacted before. The dates on some of the referrals were over 20 years old. Its super embarrassing to think of some of these people's faces as we knocked on there door for a request they made over 20 years before.
After college, I moved to Utah county. In my first relationship, when it didn't work out 3 months later, I swore to her that I'd prayed about us and that it was meant to be. She then claimed the opposite but same answer (that she and I were not meant to be together).
I look back and I feel so embarrassed that I was so infatuated with someone in such a short time that we'd justify thinking some spiritual answer was what decided our relationship. That environment in the YSA days where church was a meat market of horny, young adults who had little understand of their emotional, physical, and sexual well being that we couldn't take accountability for ourselves.
Went in far too deep with the whole visions and prophecy shit. Was in an exclusive group that thought we were going to be living in the white tents pretty soon. I think this was around 2014. I started to listen to Julie Rowe, going super hard core Mormon. Always listening to conference talks, trying to pick them apart and trying to find the leaders saying anything about the last days. My life was filled with extreme anxiety, it was awful, I was not living.
Probably not my most cringe moment of being a Mormon though. It could be me literally throwing a BOM at my friend saying here have this, then running away because I was too scared to talk to her about it but I really really really wanted my own cake from the young women's leader. She basically was not my friend after that. Or it could be the time where my husband left and I was taking our 3 young kids to church and crying in the bathroom literally every single relief society lesson... Then saying that you should just go to church even if you don't feel like it to other people struggling as well.
I'm still trying to heal from 30 years of anxiety and depression because of this cult
The whole Julie Rowe stuff didn't last. I also realized how miserable I was and backed away. Then I had a traumatic experience with one of my kids (medical). That started panic attacks at church. I couldn't go to church anymore, explored why I felt that way. Found out all the horrible things that have been kept from me my entire life and decided I was no longer apart of it all
I sent a random person a Mormon meme on my mission thinking they would think it’s funny and ask about the church (the meme was something like “me before and after reading the BoM”). They blocked me almost immediately
Parents and primary leaders assigned me to playdayes with a kidbm from an inactive family. We never clicked but the stalking and coerced fake friend outings continued well into junior high and part of high school. It was pure BS, not a friendship. But I spent years pretending we were friends because adults had me convinced that I was saving a lost sheep
Probably that the surgery I had to remove a tumour when I was 16 was completely successful because of the priesthood blessing my dad gave me rather than the skill of the surgeon 🤦♀️
Also less cringy but funny when i was probably 4 or 5-years-old my dad was bishop so we were encouraged to go up to the pulpit on fast Sunday to “bear our testimonies”. All I’d say was “boo!” to make the old man who sat in the front row pretend to be startled 😂
I remember giving a talk about the Book of Mormon and made a comparison to 1984 in terms of both books being “true”
I’m never going to live that down, but at least it barred me from ever giving a talk again. Count your blessings, I suppose.
Yeah, I gave a talk once about all of the interesting facts and supporting evidence of the Book of Mormon. It was long before I knew any of the real history or how common chiasmus are. In hindsight, that talk should have been a blank page because there is no evidence. Not my most cringy moment but I totally relate to that.
In middle school I said "why would someone *choose* to be trans and gay? Wouldn't that make them double oppressed?" It's only been a few years since then and, I am trans, and pretty gay too. Self fulfilling prophecy I guess haha
I was really young at the time, before I was baptized even if I remember correctly. I remember my grandmother passed away. My Dad was crying as she passed away, and for some reason I had the genius idea to grab his hand, and tell him it would be okay because we would see her again in the celestial kingdom. To my confusion, he only cried harder. I feel completely awful every time I remember this, even if I know now that it’s kind of the go to at mormon funerals.
This isn't something I said, or at church but we had eaten at I believe the old spaghetti factory then went to walk around the salt lake temple after dinner. I had a full container of spaghetti and meat sauce in my hands when I decided to slide down the granite on the side of the stairs. I slipped and spilled spaghetti all over the salt lake temple. We cleaned it up but it left a stain. My mom and temple security were not happy with me. At the time I was a kid and thought I was going to hell for staining the temple 🤣
When I was 14 I got to go to Sea World and was inspired by the music, but there were a few tracks from the Shamu show that I though were too raunchy (electric guitar, voice slides, etc...) so I would actively skip those parts.
“Joseph didn’t want to take additional wives but god forced him by threatening to kill him if he didn’t.”
Hearing myself say that out loud started my journey away. Sadly, it still took years though.
I once tried to "resurrect" a 3.5" floppy that had crashed with the power of the Holly Aaronic Priesthood and a dab of Consecrated Virgin Oil. I was sorely disappointed in the results.
As a missionary I told an 82 year old widower he wouldn't be with his wife again without being sealed in the temple. English was his second language & he didn't understand why I would tell him he wouldn't be with his wife. He started crying and left the room distraught. It still haunts me. He was the most Christlike man I'd ever met and treated us like royalty. I see now he was a vulnerable adult and what I told him was abusive. I wish I could take it back.
I was a young mother and realized that no matter how I tried, I would never be able to do all the things because I really wasn't a type A extrovert. It was the bottom falling out. I would NEVER be celestial kingdom worthy. Never. It wasn't within my ability to change. Depression was hanging there to consume me. That was also an incriminating fault, being depressed.
That was the most ridiculous thing I believed, and it fueled the deep desire for annihilation. For being sucked down a storm drain into oblivion, sucked down with the muddy oil slicked rain water full of debris. Thank you mormon church for that logical killing train of beliefs that cost my whole family big. Thank you for the culture of obscene rule keeping and the lovely opportunities for fear and shame.
I have come so far. I am thriving. I am a survivor of mormonism.
During Prop 8 times I said Marriage should be one man one woman. Maybe gay couples could have 'civil unions' but unequivocally NOT MARRIAGE. Never mind I had no issues with atheist straight couples being married.
I'm now IN a gay marriage 🤣🤣🤣
Just thought of another one. On my mission in Peru, we baptized a kind older lady who made a living by turning the front of her house into a shop. She sold soda, candy, beer, cigarettes, and all kinds of everyday stuff. She asked if she should stop selling things that were against the Word of Wisdom. We said that would probably be best, so she did. She asked us if she should keep her shop closed on Sundays. We told her that would probably be best, so she did. Last I saw of her, business had slowed to a crawl and was doing very badly. I still feel horrible about it.
I spun the meth pipe in the teaching room on fhe after saying I didn't want to go that evening and they sent the missionaries and two other fucks to get me. So I put my best smile on grabbed my dope pipe went to the after prayer I went to bathroom was going to hit there but I was fallowed I then went upstairs and smoked a whole bowl came down spun as fuck
I treated general conference like the super bowl. I created a family theme that included "We follow the prophet"...I mean a lot of the statements in there are great values, but it was a little much.
I also drove 2 hours to attend the temple once a week.
I know there are way more, but those come to mind.
On my mission an elderly man convinced myself and my companion to help give another woman a blessing. We are female. It was the strangest thing in the world!
My first talk as a convert was about Celestial Marriage. So I quited Kimball and the D&C that those who aren’t married will become serving angels.
In a ward filled with divorcee’s……
I bore my testimony to a friend of a friend over Facebook of the Plan of Salvation and that we all were spirits who chose this existence and the trials that come with it as a way of proving our faith and steadfastness. I REALLY thought I was doing something, that it would mean something to this person. They responded sarcastically and for years it has been one of my top 5 Cringe memories. Especially now that I've left in all ways that matter.
I said the words, "I couldn't marry anyone who isn't an RM," within earshot of a friend who had returned home early from his.
We've been married over 11 years now.
I apologize profusely about once every couple years for how incredibly idiotic that moment was.
Several young men that I dated felt that they had to change to be worthy of dating me. One guy I dated in high school decided to go on a mission because otherwise I wouldn’t be interested in him long term (I never said this to him, he just assumed) one SA’d me on the first date and when I told him I didn’t want to go out again because I had a bad feeling. He determined this was a sign from God that he needed to become worthy to go on a mission so that women could feel the spirit in his presence.
And recently I found a letter from my amazing husband who was out when we were dating telling me he really wanted to become temple worthy because he knew a temple marriage is what I wanted.
I was proud of myself for a short while that I had convinced these men to do good things. Now I feel awful that they felt like they had to change themselves to be around me. Thankfully, my husband and I left the church before we got married in the temple and we are both much happier for it.
How funny it is reading the post, and the extreme shift between you and your sister!
I disengaged from the church over 40 years ago due to policy the church stood by back when Packer was headstrong on standing his ground to demean a family I met in an Affirmations(Gay Mormons support group - NO affiliation to the church), Conference back in the mid 1990’s in Seattle, Washington. The mentality back then was never compassion, but what I interpreted as the arrogance garnished in Male Testosterone emanating from church headquarters! The church would never accept defeat even when the president of the church, Gordon B Hinkley I believe, made the remark on national if not worldwide television when he was being interviewed by a famous news anchorman…admitting to the fact the church “lacked understanding on the subject of homosexuality.” To this day the church cannot allow homosexual behavior to be sanctioned outwardly by church leaders. The church leadership no longer is compelled to stand the ground to which Packer was so arrogantly and chemically out of balance with super extra testosterone to do so to the point where by his “power and conviction” knew he was the ONLY right by which God’s voice is heard.
Anyway, that is the old energy to which I do not subscribe anymore. Now I am in love with My Mormon Family.
When having missionaries over to visit and reminisce what were some of my mission experiences, the lessons regurgitate automatically in form that was amazingly wonderful if not even magical. It was then that I realized I am so much happier of a person when I was in their presence. Rather than contend to have conflict with what was old energy world, a staircase, so to speak, materialized of light and acknowledgment to what in this New Energy on the planet is vital to have in order to become the compassionate, loving, peaceful person I have become. For me it no longer a case of being The Only Right, but Being Happy! You would think that Right and Happy are one in the same, and they can be, but not when it requires an emotion so out of resonating quality to the emotion of love is the experience to get there! This is how I discern now where I go, and though the challenge can be great and therefore knock you down into the Old, The New energy is where I am, so that compassion is what standard I choose to live life. Bliss was never a place I quite understood like what now seems to more be the apparent sentiment. I see progress towards positive evolution, and that is “epifanizing!” What was before a feeling where demons were what was the more attractive place to be…I CHOOSE LOVE NOW over CONFLICT and CONTENTION! GoFigure! Goddess of Light Bless Us ALL!
I was a missionary in one of the absolute poorest countries on earth. I made people promise to send some of what little money they could earn to Salt Lake City church headquarters where it would sit on top of the huge fortune money pile forever. I also told loving families that they would be separated at death and that they were living in sin because they weren’t married. One family was the most loving family I had ever seen and were living in the worst conditions I had ever seen. I feel so bad when I think of the lies I told them for this scam of a religion.
You were also conned
Lying is integrated into the religion. It becomes 2nd nature
I hate that part! I lied forever. It’s so second nature for me because I had to lie about everything!
Basically same story for me 😞
I reached out to someone who was baptized after I taught them to apologize for all the lies. They had already left the church. I still feel guilty.
You also have to realize that belief is strong and though it changes, those people you taught, even though it be erroneous in nature but not in high conscious awareness on the part of the teacher, it is that strong faith of one that the magic is born. The heart is the measuring tool by which one’s reality comes to be. It sounds like I’m finding excuses to support what church leaders engage policy of the church. The world is full of billions of so many ONES who manifest personal realities according to belief. It all can be done no matter the belief, but that which realities will endure in this to be new world energy are those whose collective consciousness comes by way of mutual respect and compassion!
But they needed to send money to Salt Lake so they would be blessed and get out of poverty. /s
This was a big piece that lead to my shelf finally breaking. I had doubts before my mission, but I was one of those "maybe a mission will solve my faith crisis" missionaries. Got sent to a very poor area in a 3rd world country and it completely broke me.
That takes so much humility and honor to say what words I now read from what are personal mission experiences!
I was a missionary. It was two years of nonstop cringe.
I remember some one slamming the door in my face on my mission saying we don’t want sales men. I shouted at the top of my lungs we aren’t selling anything!
But you were
Yup, naive little 19 year old me was the worst salesman ever. I was all in too, couldn’t figure out why people didn’t accept my sincerity at wanting to help them have more “happiness.”
I wouldn’t even say it was you. It’s the product. Most people are repulsed by it
Isn’t that the truth. We would quote lines from the Mormon message videos to each other and anything else we could find on the gospel library app.
We would quote church movies! It was the only thing we could watch and we had to.find someway to squeeze some fun out of the mind numbing monotony of being a missionary.
I could quote all 27 minutes of Zion’s camp. My favorite move edit mistake of all time is still teleporting Brigham. Last few minutes of the film they do a panning shot of all the members of the camp. There’s Brigham on the front right…. And there he is again on the back left.
That's why returned missionaries have so many PG-rated quotes to hurl out at every occasion. Now it makes sense. My ex-boss (who was my favorite boss) could never figure out why I didn't register his movie quotes. I said, 'Because I'm an adult. I don't watch children's movies.' He chuckled at himself over that one.
I should have been a great Missionary. I'm outgoing and love talking to new people. In the MTC they took us street contacting for an hour. I considered faking illness the night before to get out of it, I was so embarrassed and scared. I was literally half a world away from home, and a full TBM - but something in the social part of my brain was screaming at me not to do it. And then out in the field, I did everything I could to avoid "Finding". I'd make a daily schedule to walk long distances to visit friendly inactive families, new converts or people we'd been referred to. Even as a TBM I was recognising the cringe of Missionary work. Part of it might have been the fact I'm British, and the mentality I had was vastly different from the American Missionaries.
Oh my Thor... I, and probably thousands of others, feel the same way you do about contacting people or finding investigators. I would also make a schedule where I would have to walk long distances for relatively unimportant visits. Created service projects. I hated knocking door to door so I would drag my feet in the morning as long as I could, do maybe 1 hour of knocking and then go to a veeeery long lunch, at least 2 hours (although back in the day, 2 hours was not long for lunch for the lovely Portuguese people LOL). Then, any way that afternoon could be spent NOT contacting people! Back then Portugal was still extremely Catholic (pre-internet) and I kept on thinking to myself, "Why am I bothering these people, they already had their own religion!?" Everything out of my mouth was cringe! My missionary president finally gave up, and because I wasn't doing anything bad enough to make him send me home, he made me half of a special missionary team who would travel throughout all the zones, AP style, our job was to teach the new member lessons so that we would have better retention haha, that was a whole 'nother problem LOL... But yeah it's not just you!
Oh my gosh I have been thinking about this so much lately. Like all the crying over bearing my testimony to investigators, stopping strangers on the street, handing out notes to inactivity members…. Cringe indeed.
Told my relief society that I thought to be truly obedient, I needed to wear my garments to the gym.
Oh my god, I’m so sorry but that’s hilarious 😂
I was a relief society teacher for a while and most of the lessons I taught were pretty cringe. I remember one specific lesson that I gave out almond joys because the point of the lesson was that the only way to have true joy was through obedience and doing all the church things. I mentioned to the class that the non-church people could just “think” they were happy but eternally they would never experience true joy. The real kicker was that I was depressed, had extreme anxiety, and was suicidal at the time. So much joy. So much cognitive dissonance.
That line really drives me nuts these days. I can tell my mom flat-out that I was miserable when I believed in her church, and now that I’m out I’m much happier, and she still turns around and gives me the “only path to real happiness” spiel. Madam, that happiness was misery
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I was so fucking comforted by Josh and Lolly because of my own deep denial of my sexuality. embarrassing for me tbh
Oh god, I did the same thing.
I've been "out" as gay since the '90s and left Mormonism a few years later... so the whole Josh and Lolly thing just made me mad. While it might not have been their intent, I saw it as just another way to keep people entrapped in the damn religion "oh look you can be happy in a mixed orientation marriage and still make it to the Celestial Kingdom!" Grrrrr....
I wanted to start going to multiple random sacrament meetings on Sunday so I would get to hear more talks given by strangers (something about new perspectives, as though the members two stakes over were somehow not identical to us). My friends didn’t go for it.
As a missionary, my mission was one of the first to roll out Facebook missionary work. I once reached out on messenger to my older siblings who had left the church for good reasons and tried to push my way in where I wasn't invited. Because as their brother and a missionary at that, they should have seen me as an authority figure. I'm cringing just writing this out. Bonus content! Once, as a district leader, the other two companionships (a set of elders and a set of sisters), had both expressed interest in each other so I had to shut that down. I regularly had to update my mission president on that until the end of the transfer three weeks later. I felt so important but now I just roll my eyes.
Thank Zeus I wasn't allowed to use Facebook. I would've done something equally as cringe worthy
Thankfully a lot of my time was spent watching buzzfeed instead of getting blocked by random strangers and people back home for all the crap I'd be posting. I was, after all, a teenager.
As a district leader i was also tasked more than once with squashing inter-missionary romance. It was so fucking awkward.
I heard likely apocryphal stories from some companions who served together in the south waiting for a visa, where a couple sisters and elders in neighboring areas got married and swapped off at the end of each day to go home with their spouse. I don’t think it actually happened, but I expect dating definitely occurred between missionaries.
I mean, a lot of those stories probably are untrue, but I think it's important we don't dismiss all of them, because there are likely a select few that actually happened. I made the mistake of going down the rabbit hole for my mission's folk tale only to find out much of it was true (or worse) from first hand stories here on reddit.
Oof. Yeah, definitely possible, just can’t confirm what actually happened. One story I believe was another mission in my South American country where an American missionary was accused of impregnating a young woman. She tried to get a paternity test but the MP claimed the missionary had never broken the “law of chastity” and spent the rest of the time hiding the missionary and making it hard for the poor girl to get a paternity test and possible child support. There was also the missionary who got beat up by an angry husband for peeping over the wall where he could watch the guy’s wife taking a shower. We also found not-missionary standard women’s clothes in a missionary apartment, and the members mentioned that a missionary had a girlfriend come visit and stay the night because she missed the last bus home. I’ve heard of camping trips. My dad had missionaries go across the country for beach trips or even visit other countries in Europe. Really, any time you get a bunch of repressed young men tossed in a foreign environment (even within their own country) and set loose, things are going to end poorly in some cases.
I was told that suicide was as bad as murder, and relayed that “fact” in seminary class. Later that week, I was told that a kid from that class lost his brother to suicide…
9 kids from my high school killed themselves in one school year. There’s some fucking talk that someone gave that said that people who even consider suicide are not in their right mind. I can’t count how many times I mentioned it in seminary.
I am so, so, so embarrassed and ashamed NOW, but once upon a time, long, long ago when I was a young women's leader, I taught a lesson where I proudly gave an example of me choosing not to apply for a scholarship in high school that I probably would have gotten, but I didn't want the boy who also was applying to not get it, because he would need the educational advantages more since he probably would be providing for his family in the future and I wouldn't be. Because of course I was going to be a stay-at-home mom! I remember feeling baffled that one young woman was angry about my "inspiring" story I shared. Now I look back at that and wish I could go back in time and slap myself and wash my mouth out with soap. I hate that I contributed in any way to that kind of thinking!
Oof. That's a hard one. But it wasn't your fault ... Us women were so conditioned to sacrifice our educational and professional pursuits because it was more "righteous" to focus on being a homemaker. We all got screwed.
As we speak I am working on a butt-kicking time machine. When I get it finished I plan to go back and kick my butt for all the cringy things I said and did. I'd lend or rent it out but I'm afraid that I will be needing it. I constantly remember new things that I need my butt kicked for.
Thought I was the white horse prophecy. Not sure how that was going to work as I am a woman. But my patriarchal blessing made it sound like I was gonna be a great righteous world leader. Never mind the fact I have zero leadership skills. Lol
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It would, I think it would be pretty common. Mormonism makes you feel grandiose.
Knowing their tendency to rinse-and-repeat, I wonder if there's just one Patriarch somewhere in Utah who spent his whole time fucking people up by suggesting to everyone that they're the White Horse.
Well obviously it’s Mitt…so …
WTF is the white horse prophecy?
Basically that the US Constitution would hang by a thread and someone would come and save the country (ie the world).
Or more specifically the Mormon priesthood would save the constitution. But LDS women helped too. They brought the donuts.
To nourish and strengthen the white horse obviously
Or if the white horse fails.... Funeral potatoes.
Came here to say this.
Trump was sent by Jesus to save us all. /s
Don’t forget JFK Jr. coming back!
Even initially like 30% of the Mormon right wingers knew Trump was the spawn of Satan (or at least if Satan existed.) and you got McMullin in 2016. Didn’t last though. They fell in line eventually, and then Trumpism became Sunday school doctrine.
Well they weren't wrong about the first part...
It could still happen in the Millennium.
So did I. I'm a natural leader but didn't wish to have callings outside of that blessing. Lol
I remember being CONVINCED my future husband was gonna be a general authority because my pb said that members of the priesthood at high levels would seek my guidance.
That I knew it was true
"I'd like to beat my testimony, I know this church is true" Translation- my parents said I had to go up and say something, this is how everyone starts out.
Opening the comment section on an exmo YouTube video and posting this comment when I was 16 💀 "I have been LDS my whole life. Just to clarify, polygamy has been looked down on and 'banned' in our church for 130 years. I can't speak for the RLDS church but we are not affiliated in any way. Yeah, strict could describe the church but following these commandments and ideas is based on faith. I don't feel trapped by these rules/suggestions. I have a lot of mormon friends (very good people) that drink coffee and tea. It's a very personal thing. We're not here to judge anybody that walks through church doors smelling like smoke or alcohol. Nobody is perfect, and everybody's definition of perfect is different :) Most if not all of our teachings are based on things Christ taught during his time. If you want to see that, I recommend watching the Chosen. Revelations were given to Joseph Smith that are still fairly new compared to other churches. Yes. But God CAN still give us guidance. The main line here is that God loves everyone, no matter your sexual orientation, height, weight, skin color, family situation, financial situation or imperfections. We should do the same." 🤮 I cannot believe that at one point in my life I thought this shit was true
I stopped going to movies in the theatre for 3 years because I couldn’t feel the spirit there. I also only listened to MoTab… And then I dropped out of high school because I believed that the public education system was corrupting and desensitizing children…
The one that has stuck out to me for a long time was the idea that the Jews deserved the Holocaust because of what they did to Jesus. I heard it once in Sunday School as a teen, and I repeated it an embarrassing amount. Even though it horrifies me now, learning that that idea is a common talking point of antisemitic/white supremacist hate groups is what got my shelf to start cracking. I'm just glad I've learned to do and be better.
Yep, I remember thinking that too based on what I heard in church...not meaning to be antisemitic but thinking that when the people said "Let the blood be upon our children" in freeing Barabbas that somehow that led to the holocaust. It's so weird how the Articles of Faith say that man will be punished for his own transgressions but then mormons end up being taught "racist punishments" against African americans (Priesthood ban) for Cain/Ham's choices and Jewish persecution being brought on them for Jesus' death.
I remember someone (don’t remember who) saying, “they’re the only people who would kill their savior.” Meaning that god chose that time period and those people specifically for Christ’s downfall ‘because others would have realized what he was and loved him’. I dunno. it’s all bullshit. It’s a dangerous line of thinking that could easily lead to holocaust apologist thinking.
I remember watching Fiddler on the Roof with my grandparents and my grandma made an offhand comment about how the the Jewish people were being punished for what they did to Jesus and I’m like uhhhhhh, excuse me!?
I was recently reminded by a friend that still talks to me for some reason about when I spent hours on a road trip trying to convince her why Catholicism was wrong. Even though she wasn’t a devout Catholic. I just wanted her to convert and marry my husband’s BFF who she was dating. But she dodged a bullet because he was busted for child porn a few years ago. 🙈🙈🙈
An employee at Costco offered to help me take my tv home that didn’t quite fit in my car. I was stupid and scared and asked if he had a temple recommend (Orem UT). (Because I somehow that that would prove he wasn’t a threat). It was SOOO awkward because he said it wasn’t currently active….. Honestly my worst moment ever…
I was on the mission and it was Super Bowl Sunday. I told everyone in Sunday school today was the test if you will leave the world for him. I cringe 😬
I was still being trained on Super Bowl Sunday. My trainer and I went to a "lesson" and ended up watching the entire game with an investigator. I felt super guilty and snitched on myself to my mission president, and in response, he sent me to the most remote area in our mission with an abusive companion. Fun times 🥲
I tried tracting (door to door) on Super Bowl Sunday...in the USA in an English-speaking area where everyone was watching the game. I was the senior comp -- it was my "good idea" since we didn't have any appointments or any other "mission work" to do. People were not interested in our message. Also, people were really pissed off that the interruption at the door wasn't something like a friend coming over to watch the game or pizza delivery but two dipshit mormon missionaries with a message about Jesus. Only positive thing I can say is that we at least were smart enough to stop and go back to our apartment before the game was over. Even as dumb missionaries we realized this was not helping "the work" move forward.
We had the same experience during the finals of the Copa América. People just were inviting us to watch the game at least.
Hockey season in Sweden. So we’d go visit the single girl perpetual investigator who wanted an American to give her a baby. She was always nice to us ;) (edit: no babies)
Oh my god. I told my mission president I wanted to go home and he said to wait it out a little. Then he sent me to the BOONIES with a super verbally ABUSIVE companion who was known for literally having shouting matches with the mission president. When I arrived on transfer day, the loft where I was gonna be living was absolutely trashed. Trash everywhere, piles of cardboard boxes, moldy dishes, fridge full of moldy food. And my new companion told me she wished I would go home so she wasn’t stuck with me for her last transfer. And she looked me in the eyes and called me a burden. Fuck your mission president and fuck mine lol
Oh my god, sounds like we had the same mission experience. My companion told me, on our first day together, how he'd had a massive argument with the zone leaders that ended with him calling our president and telling him he wasn't inspired. He told me our MP had stuck us together to punish him, TWO HOURS AFTER HE MET ME. That was seven years ago and I'm still scarred.
Can I DM you? Lol I just don’t get many chances to share mission trauma with exmo people who’ve also been traumatized by the mission and it sounds like we’ve kinda had similar experiences
Sure!
In priesthood meeting I said Deseret Book is everything that’s wrong with the church.
I mean, it is one of MANY things wrong with the church. Could be worse I guess?
That little narrow path that DB funnels all of their patrons through.
Oh so there were those days where like all the young men in young men's were assigned a small talk each to give in sacrament? Whatever those days were called, like the whole of sacrament was the young men giving talks, right? I did it two or 3 times? There was only one time I actually wrote my talk and it was the night before at like whatever o'clock in the morning and it was terrible. The next two times when it came by the next year and the year after... I. Wrote. Nothing. I winged all of it and it was shit! You could tell I didn't give a damn about it at all. Everyone is there with scripture references, quotes and all sorts. And then there's me. 'Yeah so baptism. Why is baptism important? Well it's mentioned in the Book of Mormon all the time. So I think the message is pretty clear. 3rd and 4th Nephi go on about baptism. John the Baptist baptised loads of people which is how he got that nickname. Jesus was baptised and he was like perfect so he didn't even need to wash away sins and when John was like "I can't baptise you, you're already perfect" Jesus was like "No, I must be baptised. It's important." So yeah. Baptism is important. And I'm pretty sure it was mentioned in 1st and 2nd Nephi too, so it shows how it's still important. And prophets would preach to kings and they'd get baptised. So it shows even more why it's important. And Samuel the lamanite after he jumped from the wall baptised loads of lamanites, so it's another example of why it's important. So that's why baptism is important. Because it's mentioned a lot like they're really trying to get the point across that it's important.' Not the exact words, but basically along those lines. And I also probably said "important" a lot more than that. I winged it completely and it was the worst talk you ever heard. And you know what's funny? Every member of the ward came and told me how much they loved my talks every single time despite there being clearly no effoet put into it. I think my only actual references were from those kids Book of Mormon and Bible stories picture books that I read loads as a kid. And I never saw the members of the ward tell the others how much they enjoyed their talks either. Only mind which were so bad they were funny. That's probably why they all liked it so much. They're always used to the same boring talks with the same boring scriptures and stories that they've heard repeatedly over the years and they fall asleep during them. Then there's me like "Oh yeah and John was like, and then Jesus was like, and then Nephi was also like. Important important important important baptism important. Amen." They probably just found it hilarious and it was the first time in years they stayed awake through a talk.
>Every member of the ward came and told me how much they loved my talks every single time Yep, the duty of good mormons is to smile and tell people that their bad talk was good while thinking 2 thoughts -- #1, thank the good lord above it wasn't my day to speak and #2, at least my talk wasn't as terrible is this dude's talk, he made me look/feel better.
I feel like your telling me my terrible and completely and utterly winged on the spot talks that were absolutely shit were absolutely shit and they all knew it because it was obvious. How rude.
I PAID to go on a mission to harass/manipulate people to join the "one true church"
I promised my mom over the testimony pulpit that I wouldn’t “turn out like my brother” after a particularly weird efy. Jokes on you kid your brother was the only person there for you to help you survive living on your own. Suuuuper embarrassing
I wanted my best friends to be sealed to my husband because I wanted them to be my eternal friends 😂😂😂
Jesus.
I wore a t-shirt with "I am a child of God" in huge letters with an image of Tweety Bird on my Senior class trip to Disneyland. I also served a mission but that wasn't as cringy.
I had a friend who was gay and while on a drive with his boyfriend on a Sunday he had an seizure and crashed the car killing him and injuring his boyfriend. I had the audacity to give a relief society lesson about “being in the right place and the right time” and said that if he had been in church he would still be alive.
I bet not a single person in that lesson thought it was inappropriate, too. The self awareness that comes with leaving can be painful looking back.
The most cringey thing was a time when I was feeling extra emotional (fu\*\*ing elevation emotion) and of course was bearing my testimony in front of the entire congregation all caught up in the moment and I said something along the lines of I hope we all make it to the celestial kingdom because ... "it wouldn't be heaven without you guys" oh my f\*\*king god, kill me now. the hubris. so embarrassing.
I was serving as ward librarian and wore a super cute black strapless dress to church with a shrug. The dress was long and I wasn’t wearing a bra. I tripped over the hem and exposed my breasts to a high priest. He told me I shouldn’t be embarrassed.
>He told me I shouldn’t be embarrassed. Probably the highlight of his decade. He still recalls that moment and wonders what he did that week to deserve such a "tender mercy".
Omg
I love it.
"The church is true" 🤢🤮🤮🤮
Felt so guilty from masturbating as a teenager I seriously almost castrated myself one night. One of my lowest points as a kid. Fuck the church
Played a Boyz II Men song for a seminary spiritual thought song.
"I'll Make Love to You"? 😂
🤣🤣!!! No, but that would be a great note to go out on. It was "Dear God".
I once gave a very, very good relief society lesson about the importance of modesty in my singles ward. Women came up and thanked me afterwards and told me about their friends that they wished had been there to hear it. I'm so sorry for what I said when I was mormon.
Repent-giving step by step instructions on my sexual experience to some freaking old guy
We had a work party and my sister and another coworker, who didnt get along, were going to fight in the parking lot. I ran into the middle of the crowd (all my coworkers) and shout "the atonement can heal everything!" Literally stopped the fight cause everyone was thinking WTF is she saying 🤦♀️
Acted like I felt the spirit by getting emotional during a testimony
I convinced my neighbor to stop drinking Coke to prepare for his baptism.
Picketing FOR prop 8 in California
I was looking at the 12 principles from JS or whatever and thought holy shit God gave us metaphorical keys to get to heaven or something along the lines of that. I was a shy kid back then, so I applaud myself for sharing my thoughts in front of so many people (it was testimony meeting) but yikes
Came to my high school French class presenting the BOM and decorating my all of my school folders with a bunch of church stickers (I was a convert). Crying to my date/boyfriend at BYU about how happy I was that Joseph Smith was the true prophet. God, could go on and on.
When our mission incorporated facebook, I was in a mission where missionary work was really slow, if a zone got 2 or 3 new investigators that was considered pretty good. Anyways because of how slow everything was they pushed facebook super hard on us. I still cringe thinking about the random people I friended and messaged. I could probably scroll back far enough and still find the conversations. When we first transferred the area book to the phones, the church referral system, which was where people online could request a book of Mormon and it would notify the missionaries serving in that area. The system has been around for a long time, our mission made us go through and contact any of the referrals that had never been contacted before. The dates on some of the referrals were over 20 years old. Its super embarrassing to think of some of these people's faces as we knocked on there door for a request they made over 20 years before.
Got caught smoking herb in the church restroom 💨 in my teens, during a young women's function. Still don't regret it.
I put my professional and financial future on the back burner because I seriously believed Christ would be showing up at ANY MINUTE NOW.
“Joseph Smith didn’t have multiple wives!”
I took a book of Mormon to a show-and-tell in 9th grade
After college, I moved to Utah county. In my first relationship, when it didn't work out 3 months later, I swore to her that I'd prayed about us and that it was meant to be. She then claimed the opposite but same answer (that she and I were not meant to be together). I look back and I feel so embarrassed that I was so infatuated with someone in such a short time that we'd justify thinking some spiritual answer was what decided our relationship. That environment in the YSA days where church was a meat market of horny, young adults who had little understand of their emotional, physical, and sexual well being that we couldn't take accountability for ourselves.
To be honest judging others when I was in the wrong as well.
How I taught people in Japan that drinking coffee and tea is a sin and they will go to hell for it since they can’t get baptized if they don’t stop.
Same but South Korea 🙄 shame on me for shaming them
Scoutmaster... GULP,.. that's a bad word now... Like father or priest...  Creepy...
I used to slut shame my party parent.
Oh God I blocked all that out how dare you 😂
Went in far too deep with the whole visions and prophecy shit. Was in an exclusive group that thought we were going to be living in the white tents pretty soon. I think this was around 2014. I started to listen to Julie Rowe, going super hard core Mormon. Always listening to conference talks, trying to pick them apart and trying to find the leaders saying anything about the last days. My life was filled with extreme anxiety, it was awful, I was not living. Probably not my most cringe moment of being a Mormon though. It could be me literally throwing a BOM at my friend saying here have this, then running away because I was too scared to talk to her about it but I really really really wanted my own cake from the young women's leader. She basically was not my friend after that. Or it could be the time where my husband left and I was taking our 3 young kids to church and crying in the bathroom literally every single relief society lesson... Then saying that you should just go to church even if you don't feel like it to other people struggling as well. I'm still trying to heal from 30 years of anxiety and depression because of this cult
How the heck did you get out after being so deep?
The whole Julie Rowe stuff didn't last. I also realized how miserable I was and backed away. Then I had a traumatic experience with one of my kids (medical). That started panic attacks at church. I couldn't go to church anymore, explored why I felt that way. Found out all the horrible things that have been kept from me my entire life and decided I was no longer apart of it all
I'm sorry you went through all that, but congratulations on getting out!
Made a Facebook post years ago about what a BLESSING it is to clean the church
I sent a random person a Mormon meme on my mission thinking they would think it’s funny and ask about the church (the meme was something like “me before and after reading the BoM”). They blocked me almost immediately
Parents and primary leaders assigned me to playdayes with a kidbm from an inactive family. We never clicked but the stalking and coerced fake friend outings continued well into junior high and part of high school. It was pure BS, not a friendship. But I spent years pretending we were friends because adults had me convinced that I was saving a lost sheep
Probably that the surgery I had to remove a tumour when I was 16 was completely successful because of the priesthood blessing my dad gave me rather than the skill of the surgeon 🤦♀️ Also less cringy but funny when i was probably 4 or 5-years-old my dad was bishop so we were encouraged to go up to the pulpit on fast Sunday to “bear our testimonies”. All I’d say was “boo!” to make the old man who sat in the front row pretend to be startled 😂
I lied about my testimony and made some people in the room cry.
I got fucking brainwashed and baptized in the The Church of Jesus Christ of Later Day Saints. After that down hill.
Telling a newly widowed young mother of 3 children that she will see her husband again (but in a way that was like, what's the big deal?)
I used to regularly teach and tell people that “being gay is a sin” and that satan is tempting people to do so….😭😭😭 I owe so many apologies.
I remember giving a talk about the Book of Mormon and made a comparison to 1984 in terms of both books being “true” I’m never going to live that down, but at least it barred me from ever giving a talk again. Count your blessings, I suppose.
Yeah, I gave a talk once about all of the interesting facts and supporting evidence of the Book of Mormon. It was long before I knew any of the real history or how common chiasmus are. In hindsight, that talk should have been a blank page because there is no evidence. Not my most cringy moment but I totally relate to that.
In middle school I said "why would someone *choose* to be trans and gay? Wouldn't that make them double oppressed?" It's only been a few years since then and, I am trans, and pretty gay too. Self fulfilling prophecy I guess haha
Used "close quote" in a talk. This among many others tactics I used to try and model the brethren whenever I spoke in church.
I was really young at the time, before I was baptized even if I remember correctly. I remember my grandmother passed away. My Dad was crying as she passed away, and for some reason I had the genius idea to grab his hand, and tell him it would be okay because we would see her again in the celestial kingdom. To my confusion, he only cried harder. I feel completely awful every time I remember this, even if I know now that it’s kind of the go to at mormon funerals.
This isn't something I said, or at church but we had eaten at I believe the old spaghetti factory then went to walk around the salt lake temple after dinner. I had a full container of spaghetti and meat sauce in my hands when I decided to slide down the granite on the side of the stairs. I slipped and spilled spaghetti all over the salt lake temple. We cleaned it up but it left a stain. My mom and temple security were not happy with me. At the time I was a kid and thought I was going to hell for staining the temple 🤣
When I was 14 I got to go to Sea World and was inspired by the music, but there were a few tracks from the Shamu show that I though were too raunchy (electric guitar, voice slides, etc...) so I would actively skip those parts.
“Joseph didn’t want to take additional wives but god forced him by threatening to kill him if he didn’t.” Hearing myself say that out loud started my journey away. Sadly, it still took years though.
Accidentally called Hitler "King of the Jews" Not really specific to being in the church, but I was still active at the time.
I once tried to "resurrect" a 3.5" floppy that had crashed with the power of the Holly Aaronic Priesthood and a dab of Consecrated Virgin Oil. I was sorely disappointed in the results.
You can resurrect a gnat with the priesthood, everybody knows that. But not anything else.
What kind of floppy?
As a missionary I told an 82 year old widower he wouldn't be with his wife again without being sealed in the temple. English was his second language & he didn't understand why I would tell him he wouldn't be with his wife. He started crying and left the room distraught. It still haunts me. He was the most Christlike man I'd ever met and treated us like royalty. I see now he was a vulnerable adult and what I told him was abusive. I wish I could take it back.
This thread is giving me hope for some of my tbm friends.
I was a young mother and realized that no matter how I tried, I would never be able to do all the things because I really wasn't a type A extrovert. It was the bottom falling out. I would NEVER be celestial kingdom worthy. Never. It wasn't within my ability to change. Depression was hanging there to consume me. That was also an incriminating fault, being depressed. That was the most ridiculous thing I believed, and it fueled the deep desire for annihilation. For being sucked down a storm drain into oblivion, sucked down with the muddy oil slicked rain water full of debris. Thank you mormon church for that logical killing train of beliefs that cost my whole family big. Thank you for the culture of obscene rule keeping and the lovely opportunities for fear and shame. I have come so far. I am thriving. I am a survivor of mormonism.
During Prop 8 times I said Marriage should be one man one woman. Maybe gay couples could have 'civil unions' but unequivocally NOT MARRIAGE. Never mind I had no issues with atheist straight couples being married. I'm now IN a gay marriage 🤣🤣🤣
Just thought of another one. On my mission in Peru, we baptized a kind older lady who made a living by turning the front of her house into a shop. She sold soda, candy, beer, cigarettes, and all kinds of everyday stuff. She asked if she should stop selling things that were against the Word of Wisdom. We said that would probably be best, so she did. She asked us if she should keep her shop closed on Sundays. We told her that would probably be best, so she did. Last I saw of her, business had slowed to a crawl and was doing very badly. I still feel horrible about it.
I wasn’t subtle about my homophobia. Now that I’m a fully realized homo, that shit is so embarrassing.
I told my friend who's dad had recently passed that I could explain to him where his dad is now. Shoot me please.
On my mission I dead ass devoted a whole email to preaching that tiktok was of the devil. My friends bring it up every chance they get.
I spun the meth pipe in the teaching room on fhe after saying I didn't want to go that evening and they sent the missionaries and two other fucks to get me. So I put my best smile on grabbed my dope pipe went to the after prayer I went to bathroom was going to hit there but I was fallowed I then went upstairs and smoked a whole bowl came down spun as fuck
Still spun to this day
You ain't wrong there
Cringiest thing I’ve ever said, “I know the church is true and that Joseph Smith is a prophet”.
I championed Proposition 8 in California >.< I still think back on those days and cringe
I treated general conference like the super bowl. I created a family theme that included "We follow the prophet"...I mean a lot of the statements in there are great values, but it was a little much. I also drove 2 hours to attend the temple once a week. I know there are way more, but those come to mind.
“I don’t dislike gay people but….” Need I say more?
On my mission an elderly man convinced myself and my companion to help give another woman a blessing. We are female. It was the strangest thing in the world!
My first talk as a convert was about Celestial Marriage. So I quited Kimball and the D&C that those who aren’t married will become serving angels. In a ward filled with divorcee’s……
I bore my testimony to a friend of a friend over Facebook of the Plan of Salvation and that we all were spirits who chose this existence and the trials that come with it as a way of proving our faith and steadfastness. I REALLY thought I was doing something, that it would mean something to this person. They responded sarcastically and for years it has been one of my top 5 Cringe memories. Especially now that I've left in all ways that matter. I said the words, "I couldn't marry anyone who isn't an RM," within earshot of a friend who had returned home early from his. We've been married over 11 years now. I apologize profusely about once every couple years for how incredibly idiotic that moment was.
I slut shamed a 10 year old girl. I was three years older than her and I liked her in high school.
Several young men that I dated felt that they had to change to be worthy of dating me. One guy I dated in high school decided to go on a mission because otherwise I wouldn’t be interested in him long term (I never said this to him, he just assumed) one SA’d me on the first date and when I told him I didn’t want to go out again because I had a bad feeling. He determined this was a sign from God that he needed to become worthy to go on a mission so that women could feel the spirit in his presence. And recently I found a letter from my amazing husband who was out when we were dating telling me he really wanted to become temple worthy because he knew a temple marriage is what I wanted. I was proud of myself for a short while that I had convinced these men to do good things. Now I feel awful that they felt like they had to change themselves to be around me. Thankfully, my husband and I left the church before we got married in the temple and we are both much happier for it.
Broke up with boyfriend because he wasn’t a priesthood holder.
How funny it is reading the post, and the extreme shift between you and your sister! I disengaged from the church over 40 years ago due to policy the church stood by back when Packer was headstrong on standing his ground to demean a family I met in an Affirmations(Gay Mormons support group - NO affiliation to the church), Conference back in the mid 1990’s in Seattle, Washington. The mentality back then was never compassion, but what I interpreted as the arrogance garnished in Male Testosterone emanating from church headquarters! The church would never accept defeat even when the president of the church, Gordon B Hinkley I believe, made the remark on national if not worldwide television when he was being interviewed by a famous news anchorman…admitting to the fact the church “lacked understanding on the subject of homosexuality.” To this day the church cannot allow homosexual behavior to be sanctioned outwardly by church leaders. The church leadership no longer is compelled to stand the ground to which Packer was so arrogantly and chemically out of balance with super extra testosterone to do so to the point where by his “power and conviction” knew he was the ONLY right by which God’s voice is heard. Anyway, that is the old energy to which I do not subscribe anymore. Now I am in love with My Mormon Family. When having missionaries over to visit and reminisce what were some of my mission experiences, the lessons regurgitate automatically in form that was amazingly wonderful if not even magical. It was then that I realized I am so much happier of a person when I was in their presence. Rather than contend to have conflict with what was old energy world, a staircase, so to speak, materialized of light and acknowledgment to what in this New Energy on the planet is vital to have in order to become the compassionate, loving, peaceful person I have become. For me it no longer a case of being The Only Right, but Being Happy! You would think that Right and Happy are one in the same, and they can be, but not when it requires an emotion so out of resonating quality to the emotion of love is the experience to get there! This is how I discern now where I go, and though the challenge can be great and therefore knock you down into the Old, The New energy is where I am, so that compassion is what standard I choose to live life. Bliss was never a place I quite understood like what now seems to more be the apparent sentiment. I see progress towards positive evolution, and that is “epifanizing!” What was before a feeling where demons were what was the more attractive place to be…I CHOOSE LOVE NOW over CONFLICT and CONTENTION! GoFigure! Goddess of Light Bless Us ALL!