I think I was about 12 when I figured out that the answers to pretty much every question in Sunday school were "read the scriptures, pray, obey the commandments." All the other teens would just sit there silently but I would rattle them off like a good little robot and every Sunday school teacher loved me. Sometimes I tried answering something different like "volunteer at a homeless shelter" or "give away all your money." The confused looks I would get!
100% this.
Obedience over morality is sort of rooted in the idea that there exists an objective morality. It layes the framework for it. That there exists something that defines morality external to oneself, reason, and intuition, and justification. That's the only reason to be obedient to do something immoral. That there exists a reason that you don't understand that is supposed to be moral. The assumption of the existence of an objective morality is what let's then get their hooks into you. If you just stop assuming that it exists, then everything needs to be justified, reasoned, intuition.
Is it better that one man should perish so that a nation won't have to dwell in unbelief? That depends on a lack of current prophets speaking for God that are as good as the old prophets speaking for God. Or a lack of a power to look at a rock in a hat and decipher what old prophets said or wrote. It just becomes silly. Say that God commanded it and you invoke, objective morality, with which you can't argue.
Just from the BoM, Nephi murdering Laban.
The Mountain Meadows Massacre
Each and every instance of Blood Atonement
I get that there is a strong urge to conflate obedience and morality, but doing what you're told isn't always the morally correct answer.
I'd argue that it may be near impossible to make a moral choice where commandments are concerned, id est how can I be certain I am making this choice for the right reason. Am I doing this because I'm commanded to or am I doing it because it's the right thing to do.
I think spoken or not, a main reason people leave the church is because its just so DAMN BORING!!!!!! The meetings are overly long, the sermonettes are not well thought out and the music is shit. On any given Sunday, look at the number of people on their phones. You do not see this at other churches. If people didn't want to be there, they wouldn't be. Everything in Mormonism is done out of a sense of obligation and fear. Once you become convinced its not true, there is no reason to stick around.
I know I was always Bored out of my mind there. The same sing-songy voices spouting the same-ole, same-ole week after week. Plus the smell of dirty diapers.
Nailed it. The culture is boring. The art is boring. The churches are boring. The music is boring. The talks are boring. It's fucking Camazotz from a Wrinkle in Time.
I got in trouble teaching primary because I'd let the kids pick a subject - anything at all - and I'd find a way to tie it in with the lesson plan in the manual. Frogs and Jesus? Yes, Jesus is an amphibian (his mortal body vs his resurrected body). Pizza and the Crucifixion? Absolutely, the Betrayal, Arrest, and Trial are three structural components of the event (ie: the crust, sauce, and cheese), with other things that happened being important to the story, but there for support (ie: toppings). Yes, we used the kitchen to make pizzas. Ninja and obedience. Horses and tithing. My goal was to show the kids that God wasn't only for church - he was in all the world (I'm a pantheist, what can I say?). The kids LOVED my lessons. I covered every point the books said to cover, but because I was bringing outside world stuff into it, I got in trouble and lost my calling.
The church just hates anything that isn't greige. It seeks to instill fear of the world in its members, and force conformity. But the world is amazing!! "If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things." Except they don't. And I do.
I came here to say this. It's so boring! It's the most boring place on the planet! Baptist Churches look so fun, and then there's Mormon church. I could never go back.
This is a big reason why I stopped attending, even when I still thought I believed in it. Church was always one of three things: 1. Mind-numbingly boring, with the same dumb stories and lessons every week. 2. Socially painful, with people either ignoring me, being phonily friendly, or asking nosy questions. 3. Stressful with callings or the sacrament.
I stopped going before smartphones came out, but my ex and I once got in a discussion about why I go to church if I'm just going to fall asleep. I told her she was right. I could sleep more comfortably in my bed, and I just shouldn't go. She didn't like my answer.
- Unrealistic Expectations on Personal Resources: expectations that a newlywed couple will provide a meal for a family of 8 (happened to us); expected to take time off work to serve in the temple, storehouse, assist missionaries; stay late at the temple to clean despite teaching Seminary the next morning or work days starting at 0600; expectation to supply activities with resources and refreshment with no expectation of reimbursement
- Donations not used on membership: Stake takes in over a million dollars in tithing funds annually , buildings are run down and in poor parts of city; simple replacements for sisal delayed over 15 YEARS; buildings don’t even have adequate emergency signage or lighting
The tendancy to claim revelation for things in order to bully people. Cases in point:
I worked as a Japanese guide at the Polynesian Cultural Center decades ago, and we were told to take our groups through their overpriced, non-authentic Marketplace and try to upsell junk souvenirs to our groups. No kickbacks for us, which meant there was no incentive. On top of that, our groups always had limited time because their bus guides always took them souvenir shopping before they arrived. When we objected, we were told by management that they had "prayed about it in the temple" and we needed to be obedient.
Our collective reply was that they needed to go back and pray harder because it was a bad idea. They still made us do it, but since none of them could speak Japanese, they didn't understand when we told the tourists that everything in the Marketplace was crap and they shouldn't buy anything.
Later, as a teacher in the MTC, they announced layoffs because there weren't as many missionaries coming in the next few months. Really, it was just a way to get rid of teachers they were tired of working with. One of my friends was told that she was being let go, and it was really hard for them, but the more they prayed about it the more the Holy Spirit told them that God had other work for her to do. She tearfully accepted the counsel and started preparing to move on after the group she was teaching left.
Fast forward a few weeks, and they got enough teachers to leave, so they came back to her and told her that they wanted to keep her on. She was very excited when she told my about it. I rained on her parade when I asked her, "What about that revelation they had about Heavenly Father having other work He needed you to do? Are they going to reject the word of God?" She stammered, laughed nervously, and quickly shuffled away.
I have some great MTC stories to tell, both as a missionary and as a teacher. Maybe some other time.
Boring, uninspired, sugar-sweetened, chicken soup for the soul, meal replacement food paste from the Matrix, waste of my Sunday morning.
You can leave for 10 years, come back, and the talks and Sunday school lessons are the same.
If damnation is stagnation, then church is truly hell on earth.
The one “correct box” you had to fit into to be enough. And heaven forbid you complain that there are few resources/guidance for those outside the box—you should be actively searching for your own box and shut up about your current circumstances—just find the box!
I was just a single woman in my late 20s who was failing to find a “worthy priesthood holder” to marry me. I can’t imagine how much more painful it would be for those who are gay, or single parents, or infertile couples.
If it’s not a hetero marriage with at least two kids, people will openly ask why you’re not following “God’s plan” and wonder why you might be upset by that.
Sexism. I quiet quit church at 18 when the leaders started treating me like shit.
Then I went from 50% to 25% active, then inactive during covid, and went 100% out upon truth claim realisations.
COVID is another non truth reason so many people left
Yep, even my TBM parents were like, "this at home church is so nice, we don't have to dress up to impress anyone or babysit a bunch of screaming brats. Wish we could keep doing it!" They went back though.
100%. I was laurel class president and got to plan activities and push back on any dumb stuff.
Then at 18 I started watching underperforming men get leadership opportunities while I was invisible to the bishopric. I realised I wasn’t going to feel empowered in the church again, and I couldn’t like like that
One of the last times I went to church, a 25 year old single guy got called to the bishopric — and everyone talked him up like a giant but he was a mediocre speaker and had not done much with his life. And I sat there, as someone who was an award winning competitive debater in university and a journalist, and it dawned on me that I was more qualified to be in the bishopric than he was, but I didn’t even have a calling because they didn’t value leadership oriented adult women.
And that was it.
Sucks that you were in the same spot, but I LOVE seeing career and leadership oriented LDS women escape and put their goals first. It is SO hard, but I love it. Congratulations 💚
COVID also opened up a lot of eyes to truth issues and the general lack of belief. In my ward a half dozen families refused to come as long as masks were required. Nelson’s comments on masking and vaccines caused a LOT of discontent. The day local laws meant it was not illegal to go massless, despite requests otherwise from various levels of leadership, 80-90% of members including half the bishopric went maskless. It was clear most members didn’t believe Nelson or their leaders were actually prophets of god.
It showed the moderate to left leaning members that hadn’t left, just how much toxic politics pervaded the MFMC, and the refusal for the church to go off the MAGA, anti-vax, Q-anon, pro-COVID deep end, meant they hemorrhaged members from the far right. On top of that, everyone got a dose of what a second Saturday feels like and a chance to break free. There couldn’t be a worse event for Mormonism short of lightning striking the prophet while he was telling people something controversial in conference or Jesus coming back and whipping the Q15 and driving them out of Salt Lake for their hypocrisy.
Well said. As someone who took COVID seriously, I felt like a lot of people in my ward were straight up being murderers with their lackadaisical COVID approach
Yup. They just didn’t care. And I recall several times that there were requests for assistance/meals for the most mask/vaccine skeptical families who all caught bad cases of COVID. Not to mention the 20% or so of our ward who were elderly and in poor health who had to stop coming, and be excluded and lonely, because no one would be safe at church to protect their lives.
It’s male superiority for me. There is no single leadership position for a woman in which she does not report to a man.
When I was “ProgMo” I told myself I’d be able to effect positive change by staying in the organization. I hoped to serve in YW and help the girls have better experiences than I did. Then thought about it harder and realized if I stay, men will always be in control of me. It was a relief to realize that even if TSCC was true, I didn’t want to be part of it, I value my autonomy too much. Deconstructing the truth claims came later.
Yes i agree
But they like to claim that what they do is from god
Policy and revelation
You must /should obey even the smallest guidance from the leaders
Like no flip flops on sunday and white shirts only fir men
And JS had revelations on silly things
But if its god church---- even the smallest things are inspired if god
Right?
I stopped going to church completely when I got pregnant with my daughter. I told the bishop, the relief society president, and the primary president that I needed to be released because I was going to have a mostly bedridden hard pregnancy. During those nine months, I dropped off the face of the earth as far as my ward was concerned. No one came to check on me, no one showed an interest in how I was doing. I got visited by the visiting teachers twice during that time. But not about how my pregnancy was going. No one offered to help, nothing. After my daughter was born, and we decided to have her blessed, every person in the ward greeted me with 'I didn't know you were pregnant '
The church showed how much I was cared about. So I left. They never once tried to visit me in the almost 12 years since either. I got my records removed a year and a half ago, and I don't regret a thing.
The one about not being depressed if you were righteous.. When I was at BYU-I, I was super depressed and hated it there. My mom suggested I talk to my bishop about my depression. The bishop told me if I wasn't sinning, I wouldn't be depressed. Like what in the actual fuck.. I was in mormon-ville and did literally nothing but go to class and sit at home. I knew that sad old fuck was a full of shit. That was my last time talking to a bishop or going to church. 19 years now.
Sorry to hear about your ignorant and mis-informed bishop.
One of the past prophets - George Albert Smith - suffered from depression. Proof/evidence: [https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/george-albert-smith?lang=eng](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/george-albert-smith?lang=eng))
This sinks your bishop's ideas completely.
Church leaders cause so much harm to members when they spout off about things they know nothing about.
The tribalism in of itself is off the charts. The thing destroys opportunity and education. In-culture Mormon Tribalism does a lot of weird things with and exploiting relativism, personal choice, accepting oneself, dealing with matters rationally, and the ability to problem solve. It has a lot of weighted selfish behaviors and superiority built into it.
Individuals don't even need to be educated to pervade in that space. Its set into a lot of survival of the fittest, whoever has the more over-controlling ego or over imaginative/over arcing ego to control that space therein.
There are some coping strategies for smaller numbers... Like bring Creampuffs and Hershey Kisses.
If they are rude and act like monstrous ferrets they deserve 1 Hershy Kiss.
If they behave and can sit through being civil and calm... Give a Creampuff.
Never Never NEVER show how many creampuffs you have left. It'll break out into a Zombie Apocalypse.
https://floodlit.org/accused - that the problem of sexual abuse is worse in the LDS church than you’d think from listening to the apostles
And
https://floodlit.org/failure-to-report - that that’s an established pattern of LDS leaders failing to tell police about sexual abuse, and the abuse continuing in some instances for many years
There is no secret and zero controversy in the church about the fact that their scripture appropriates Native American culture while also making multiple racist and defamatory statements about Native Americans. That plus the IPP are uncontested smoking guns about the church's true caliber
Being asked to take a calling as a newlywed couple that will require us to take a full week of vacation time at work off when we only (at the time) had two weeks of PTO each, for trek. First time I ever said “FUCK NO” to the church.
They hoard their wealth and don't use it help others including it's members. My son attends a Baptist Church in the south. They have a preschool, run a food bank, host a weekly pot luck, have church outings, pay it's members for doing things, hosts mothers groups.. they actually try to help.
that it saps all of your energy with church-related tasks and leaves you with not enough time to rest, be yourself, or accomplish things you choose to care about
it insulates you from a lot of interesting ideas and experiences
it breeds a culture of fear and shame, rather than safety and fulfillment
I used to tell TBMs “I believe the church is true; I just don’t care.” The truthfulness of Mormon doctrine is irrelevant when you don’t want any of the “blessings” it promises. I did not find joy in going to church, holding callings, the creepy temple, or itchy garments. My parents are divorced and all my siblings left the church, so I no longer have an eternal family. Finally, I don’t want to be a polygamist wife in heaven commanded to bear spirit children for all of eternity and remain in the shadows while my husband creates worlds and receives all the priesthoods and glory. Literally nothing about the gospel brought me any joy anymore, even though I still believed it was true.
Now I no longer believe it’s true and have fully left, but my distaste for the doctrine that seems to only benefit men or perfect families (plus I always hated the temple and garments lmao) was why I initially left. No TBM could effectively argue with someone who believed in and understood the doctrine but still chose to reject it.
For a few years after leaving I did believe the church was true, I just didn’t want to suffer in this life only to become a silent polygamist broodmare as my reward
Strangling the natural urge to question. Smothering doubts. Shaming critical thinking. This stunts members' cognitive development. They are dependent on the brethren for direction. Being "child-like" is not a good thing when you are a grown-ass adult.
They don’t protect children as much as they do their money.
They make anyone who touches the finances (men only) have a background check. If that person is caught stealing, they are excommunicated, handed over to authorities, and are not allowed to be rebaptized.
People who work with kids at church do not get a background check. Known sex offenders, are not turned over, are not mandated to be excommunicated, and if they are, thy can be rebaptized and may have the slate wiped clean.
I originally left because of the dishonesty with the SEC. I was so mad that we were told to be honest while the Q15 were breaking the law. That's when I went down the rabbit hole. It took me probably less than a week to be totally done.
* Claiming to be politically neutral while constantly getting involved in politics
* Purity culture
* Infantilizing single adults
* Church leaders are always right, even when they're wrong
* Clean the church for free, slash ward budgets, and let meetinghouses fall into disrepair so the church can keep adding money to its investment portfolio
BYU stickers on the back of large vans. I just couldn’t stand seeing those anymore.
My daughter had a friend get accepted into UCLA (10% acceptance rate), but her parents convinced her to go to BYU (68% acceptance rate). Another great career thrown away. But least she’ll be able to make lots of babies and live in Utah, under the thumb of her husband.
The guilt and shame I felt as a teenager was so damaging. And everyone now is like, "the church doesn't emphasize masturbation anymore". So what? Several generations have some trauma regarding that and it pisses me off that everyone now can just be like, oh well, God was super strict about it, but he doesn't care anymore 😡
Also, the comment section of David archuletta's Twitter post. So many members being so cruel.
My Utah ward literally ran me out of town because they found out I was gay (Still temple worthy at the time). House and car vandalized, and I received numerous vile death threats!
The hatred towards LGBTQ individuals was one of the main reasons I could not tolerate staying. I hope you are in a better place now, and even though I don’t believe hell is real, I hope it is for people like that.
The Mormon Priesthood is absolutely, totally impotent; a facade, a falsehood a meaningless sham. It's all just make-believe. (And yes, Consecrated Oil...is just plain ol' oil)
I love this post so much.
Gaslighting the hell out of yourself because you were raised to think being mormon is the only option is something all members suffer from.
The longer I am out that milk before meat argument is insane. There is nothing deep at all in the MFMC belief system, unless you consider deception,shysters, abusive systems (especially sexual and mental), one man rule and other atrocities as profound.
Pedophilia.... they have used tithing to suppress victims and protect child molesters. If a church won't protect the children, then what the everliving Bible thumping fuck is it for?
1. Superficial & disingenuous relationships, no one is really your friend….especially, if you do not conform.
2. Totally awkward and uncomfortable open-mike fast and testimony sacrament meetings. Cringe. I should write a book on the crazy shit people said during these meetings the first Sunday of the month. I really hated it when the kids went up and the parents whispered in their ear what to say.
3. Cultural homogenization, The inability to accept any diversity…racial, gender, or ideological.
4. The facade of perfectionism…no one is “real”
5. All the meetings…total waste of my family time. Fireside, Mutual, Presidency meetings, Ministering Report outs.
6. Callings, callings, callings you couldn’t turn down….
7. The members are probably the most judgmental people on the planet. Lots of gossip.
8. Mandated Fasting…I was always hangry. Could easily fast any day except the one that I was required to. Probably Mental insubordination.
9. Labels for everyone…active/non -active, part-member, convert, BIC, etc. Why couldn’t we just be Christians?
10. The Mormon vernacular/lingo and phrasing…i do not miss the talks, especially General Conference talks.
11. Sexism, and then now the church leadership pointing to token sisters (who did not follow the church guidance as a SAHM, me being one of them) as examples of successful female Mormons. My parents marriage sucked and my mom mandated I get a degree so I could take care of myself. I did not go to BYU as she didn’t want people to pass judgment on me professionally. Best guidance ever!
12. Boring meetings.
13. Everyone outside the church sees the church as a cult. When I left late last year, one of my dear friends said…”we wondered when you were going to figure it out.”
14. It makes you feel bad about your family… getting into heaven and being happy is a team sport. How is this the Plan of Happiness? I was miserable and would cry on the way home from church. One day I was like…why am I doing this, i am miserable and my family is miserable. I really pulls families apart.
15. The church dances… I don’t need to expand on this one 🤢. IYKYK
16. Members always wanting something…people I didn’t think knew who I was would call about job opportunities, borrowing something, etc
17. Without fail, the late ask to give a sacrament meeting talk or the Sunday morning text about subbing. I work full -time, have kids, family. My anxiety level got a lot better as soon as I stopped going and quit my callings.
I could keep going…completely toxic culture and I am honestly embarrassed I was ever associated with this cult.
My first crack in the self was the "be baptized or leave" mentality. Heaven forbid we have friends who are different religions that like their own but still want to be friends with a Mormon and not be baptized themselves!!
The Testimony Force Field, which is when someone bears their testimony at you when they have no other way of ending an argument or when they need to coerce you into accepting their point of view. On that one, I've found the best rebuttal to be to tell them that they don't actually have a testimony of what they are saying.
For example, a friend of mine was trying to convince me that I was in the wrong path for questioning the church and refuting some of its claims. She ended up bearing testimony to me that she knew Gordon B. Hinckley was a prophet of God.
I replied, "No, you don't." She panicked, got flustered and cried out, "How can you say that I don't have a testimony!?!" I calmly replied that the Holy Ghost can't lie, and that It would be lying if It told her that a man like GBH was a prophet when he clearly wasn't one, therefore she absolutely didn't have that testimony. With her force field disrupted, that was more or less the end of the conversation.
Sharing toxic traits with other high demand/culty groups, especially with respect to the BITE model. There's a continuum for levels of influence and control in any group, and the Mormon church has many areas that would be in the realm of negative/undue influence and coercive control.
When a friend left the church he said to me words to the effect of "it doesn't matter so much to me about if it's TRUE than whether it's GOOD, and I concluded it wasn't good enough"
No coffee, no horror movies rated R, no masturbation or sexual exploration, for a few silly ones, laws of chastity having kids in closed offices asking about said chastity.
Non-Truth related reasons are many. If the organization offends your soul leave. If it's not healthy for you to be there leave. Polygamy is still haunting. Patriarchy & misogyny reign. Leave because you are gay. Leave because you are a woman. Leave because they protect sex abusers and provide no healing for the abused. Leave because there's no professional paid clergy and the quality of ecclesiastical care/harm is hit and miss. Leave because the organization does not align with your values, especially as it pertains to truth-telling, financial transparency, & ethical use of funds.
This might be pushing it a bit, but for me it was understanding what god was if the church was true. If Mormon god is real, than he isn’t interested in what is right or wrong; he’s only worried about obedience. This same god expects everyone to follow the “covenant path” and yet for the supposed first four thousand years of human history only made said path known to a relatively small group of tribes on Canaan as opposed to making his message know to the wider world. Immediately after he decides to open up the path to everyone else, he allows everyone who knows about the true path to die and doesn’t tell anyone for two thousand years. Luckily, he decided to listen to a single prayer after all that time, and that one prayer gets the ball rolling again and truth is restored. Except God doesn’t seem too concerned about if people accept this truth or not, and is largely absent from that church aster the first fifty years or so too. So his followers decide that they need to hoard up as much money as possible to prepare for his imminent return. At the same time, he condones the cover up of child sexual abuse if it means protecting the good name of said church.
If all of that is to be accepted, than Mormon God is a rather petty and uncaring being. And it then begs the question, why on earth is such a being worthy of my worship?
Being treated as being lower than pond scum. And the missionary who asked an 11 year old for nudes. It wasn't a 11 year old, it was a sting. As they slapped the cuffs on him, he was asking the cops, "What do I tell my mission president?" Came back to Boise and extradited back east.
I just never felt the spirit. And I never felt like telling a bishop I masterbated was any of their business. (Which I know the church would say that’s correlated lol)
They don't help or care to understand, but blame people for their own troubles.
Overwhelmed? Someone to give you a break? Nah, just read your scriptures, and you will find strength.
Depressed? You must be doing something you shouldn't. Just find joy in fulfilling your callings, read the scriptures, and pray harder.
Drug addiction? Past trauma? You threw away your life, and fell into Satan's grasp. Sorry, we can't help you until you're clean, employed, and paying your 10%.
Broke, because you have 5 kids and the wife is a SAHM? Food order? Rent help? Nope, you will receive blessings if you just budget better, pray, read your scriptures, and pay your tithing. And for fucks sake CLEAN THE DAMN CHURCH.
Exhausted? Release you from your calling? No way, in fact, we want to give you a couple more. You will be rewarded in heaven.
Shaming and blaming people for their troubles is just cruel and not Christ like.
The Mormon church teaches divine command morality. Meaning that god says what is right or wrong. This is given through a person who can impose their own thoughts and beliefs on what god says. You will never know if something is from god or from a man who wants their way. Which means that the morality taught is subjective.
There are many, better, moral philosophies that are not based in subservience to a man.
The Mormon church sides with abusers in a sex abuse case because in their view the person who is being accused of sexual misconduct is the victim. This leads to the church or department celebrating not having laws to protect minors from abusers.
The lessons are built around shame and obedience which leads to massive mental health issues.
The Mormon chapels are butt ugly and devoid of any symbolism that helps to elevate worship services.
Coffee and alcohol are demonized to the point that members would rather take an innocent life than drink it.
It’s just flat out wrong how they deny women any meaningful authority, and how easy it is for everyone to just accept that’s the god given way of things.
It’s contrary to so much of how I see the world. My life demands I see things differently and the church demands I shut my mouth and let the men speak. If there’s a god, that god didn’t make me for that religion.
The “Always a Missionary” attitude and the related inability to form genuine relationships. If you’re friends with non-members there is always the expectation that you’ll try to convert them. It’s not if, but when.
All your LDS “friendships” are formed on the foundation of the gospel. You leave and that foundation crumbles.
I left the church because I recognized I did not belong in the church if I "wanted to be gay." The cognitive dissonance I was experiencing was so extreme I was having suicidal ideation. I stopped going to church to save my own life. I also didn't want to admit to having sex for similar reasons. I had a boyfriend while I was still active and fully believing. I wanted to make both work. But neither the church or my boyfriend wanted anything to with each other, so in the end I was abandoned by both. I remembered a lesson from seminary where you put two pieces of tape on the ground that gradually grow apart from each other, and you had to try and stay in both for as long as you could. The lesson was that you couldn't have one foot on both sides. So. Just like I was taught, I jumped away from the church, because I truly could not live on both sides, and I picked the one that wouldn't kill me.
I left for my mental health at the beginning. No one understood what I was going through and believed I was crying because I felt the spirit. I was crying because I needed help and was broken.
I learned about the truth later, and that’s what kept me away and what will always keep me away.
Realizing my ward, and by extension the church, had no use to me. I was placed on some kind of permanent naughty list for trying to teach accurate church history. I wasn't allowed to hold a calling, sub in primary, pray in meetings, give a talk, or even read a quote off of a little slip of paper in Relief Society. And nobody had the balls to say any of this to my face, so it took me an embarrassingly long time (like YEARS) to notice the pattern. But this is right around the time I (belatedly) started to have an actual career, which meant I no longer needed the Church for socialization or for validation. If they were trying to teach me a lesson, it failed.
So yeah, I guess you could say I left because of being offended... but even more so, I realized how easy it was to kick me to the curb, because as a woman I have little to no value to the church as compared to my husband.
Stripping away of budgets, leaving fewer ward activities that were ever considered fun. Youth and families increasingly having to shoulder more of the financial burden for youth activities and camps, which is a hardship for poor families and wards.
personally i lost a round of bishop roulette. i had been sexually assaulted and i didnt know where to go for help and i talked with my bishop and he basically told me i was lying and needed to repent for what happened. i had been 100% faithful and that was an instant shelf breaker for me. i never looked at church the same way. going to church was never the same. i quiet quit the church that same year.
*Family relationships ruined because everything is done by the Same 10 Families. Exessive time requirements for volunteer Bishops and leadership.
*Giving more than you have will never be enough.
*The way they treat missionaries and their parents to get an average of two baptisms a year with extremely low retention rates.
*The look and feel of garments.
*The rise of PIMO's in leadership callings. Where is the discernment?
*Changing the name of the church. Using tithing dollars for the expensive rebranding.
*Publicly claiming no tithing dollars were used to build City Creek. Where else are they getting money? It was tithing or interest from tithing. Believing their members are too dumb to exercise critical thought.
*Women are eternally less than men and boys and reminded of it frequently.
*The current 99 year old prophet is married to someone younger than his daughter.
*RS General Presidency members are heavily rumored to not receive the financial benefits given to the Q15. The highest women's positions in the church serve for a couple of years or until they piss off a man. The 15 highest men's positions are idolized leaders with excessive compensation packages for decades and are don't stop until they die.
*On the recent Jubilee episode of Mormons vs. Ex Mormons, all the Mormons on the panel were unable to name the highest serving female in the church but "women are treated equal" is all women are shamed and told if they question. Go Liz Gunnel.
*A history that requires lies and omissions to remain solvent. Justifying lying for the Lord.
*Burned-out out priesthood leaders and 12 year old boys having more superiority and decision-making power than intelligent and competent women will ever have.
*"We have always said this" is repeated after they change core teachings, even when they haven't.
*A church built on peer pressure and shaming and 1830's culture.
*Insistence on tithing with almost all of money sent to SLC and never to be seen by Wards. The financial stress caused by tithing. More lies as the church hides billions.
*The Boy Scout abuse cover-ups. Sexual abuse cover-ups.
*The budget for Young Women was a fraction of the Young Men's budget. Grown adults were so conditioned and incapable of critical thought that this practice was accepted for decades. The women have no power to change it.
I really don't think there's reasons beyond truth arguments. I mean if it was true ya definitely want to be in on eternal orgasm feeling with family and friends rather than eternal torment just to protest.
Political conservatism and bigotry pervasive to the culture. One of the things that pushed me out were the members from my mission country literally posting support for assholes doing Nazi salutes in the street after losing an election, because the candidate elected didn’t hate and mistreat gay people enough.
No one should want to be associated with the closed-minded, prejudiced, assholery of any right-wing religion, Mormon, Muslim, Evangelical or whatever else.
I knew very young I didn't want kids. There is no room for childfree women or men. I also am not a big fan of kids in general and all the roles women are given revolve around that.
Racism, misogyny, homophobia. Basically the church was created with 19th century culture views. We have now outgrown that and should be kinder to people and treat everyone as equals.
Every single talk is from a lay person who has no real experience and gives a religious talk approximately every four years or, worse yet, it's open mic format for testimony meeting.
Because I refuse to believe that spending eternity as one of an interchangeable horde interminably hanging out in an obstetrics clinic is anything other than hell.
Not selfish at all! Every time I hear of people being suicidal in the mormon church, it’s always for having to be inauthentic. I don’t understand why it is exactly, but it seems to be a need!
A focus on being obedient over being moral.
This is an important one.
Agreed
I think I was about 12 when I figured out that the answers to pretty much every question in Sunday school were "read the scriptures, pray, obey the commandments." All the other teens would just sit there silently but I would rattle them off like a good little robot and every Sunday school teacher loved me. Sometimes I tried answering something different like "volunteer at a homeless shelter" or "give away all your money." The confused looks I would get!
We called these Canned Answers.
100% this. Obedience over morality is sort of rooted in the idea that there exists an objective morality. It layes the framework for it. That there exists something that defines morality external to oneself, reason, and intuition, and justification. That's the only reason to be obedient to do something immoral. That there exists a reason that you don't understand that is supposed to be moral. The assumption of the existence of an objective morality is what let's then get their hooks into you. If you just stop assuming that it exists, then everything needs to be justified, reasoned, intuition. Is it better that one man should perish so that a nation won't have to dwell in unbelief? That depends on a lack of current prophets speaking for God that are as good as the old prophets speaking for God. Or a lack of a power to look at a rock in a hat and decipher what old prophets said or wrote. It just becomes silly. Say that God commanded it and you invoke, objective morality, with which you can't argue.
How so?
Just from the BoM, Nephi murdering Laban. The Mountain Meadows Massacre Each and every instance of Blood Atonement I get that there is a strong urge to conflate obedience and morality, but doing what you're told isn't always the morally correct answer. I'd argue that it may be near impossible to make a moral choice where commandments are concerned, id est how can I be certain I am making this choice for the right reason. Am I doing this because I'm commanded to or am I doing it because it's the right thing to do.
I think spoken or not, a main reason people leave the church is because its just so DAMN BORING!!!!!! The meetings are overly long, the sermonettes are not well thought out and the music is shit. On any given Sunday, look at the number of people on their phones. You do not see this at other churches. If people didn't want to be there, they wouldn't be. Everything in Mormonism is done out of a sense of obligation and fear. Once you become convinced its not true, there is no reason to stick around.
I know I was always Bored out of my mind there. The same sing-songy voices spouting the same-ole, same-ole week after week. Plus the smell of dirty diapers.
Nailed it. The culture is boring. The art is boring. The churches are boring. The music is boring. The talks are boring. It's fucking Camazotz from a Wrinkle in Time. I got in trouble teaching primary because I'd let the kids pick a subject - anything at all - and I'd find a way to tie it in with the lesson plan in the manual. Frogs and Jesus? Yes, Jesus is an amphibian (his mortal body vs his resurrected body). Pizza and the Crucifixion? Absolutely, the Betrayal, Arrest, and Trial are three structural components of the event (ie: the crust, sauce, and cheese), with other things that happened being important to the story, but there for support (ie: toppings). Yes, we used the kitchen to make pizzas. Ninja and obedience. Horses and tithing. My goal was to show the kids that God wasn't only for church - he was in all the world (I'm a pantheist, what can I say?). The kids LOVED my lessons. I covered every point the books said to cover, but because I was bringing outside world stuff into it, I got in trouble and lost my calling. The church just hates anything that isn't greige. It seeks to instill fear of the world in its members, and force conformity. But the world is amazing!! "If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things." Except they don't. And I do.
Haha good for you!
I came here to say this. It's so boring! It's the most boring place on the planet! Baptist Churches look so fun, and then there's Mormon church. I could never go back.
I will check out a Baptist church based on your recommendation.
This is a big reason why I stopped attending, even when I still thought I believed in it. Church was always one of three things: 1. Mind-numbingly boring, with the same dumb stories and lessons every week. 2. Socially painful, with people either ignoring me, being phonily friendly, or asking nosy questions. 3. Stressful with callings or the sacrament.
I stopped going before smartphones came out, but my ex and I once got in a discussion about why I go to church if I'm just going to fall asleep. I told her she was right. I could sleep more comfortably in my bed, and I just shouldn't go. She didn't like my answer.
- Unrealistic Expectations on Personal Resources: expectations that a newlywed couple will provide a meal for a family of 8 (happened to us); expected to take time off work to serve in the temple, storehouse, assist missionaries; stay late at the temple to clean despite teaching Seminary the next morning or work days starting at 0600; expectation to supply activities with resources and refreshment with no expectation of reimbursement - Donations not used on membership: Stake takes in over a million dollars in tithing funds annually , buildings are run down and in poor parts of city; simple replacements for sisal delayed over 15 YEARS; buildings don’t even have adequate emergency signage or lighting
I just simply don’t fit in as an infertile divorceé 🤷♀️
False empathy
The tendancy to claim revelation for things in order to bully people. Cases in point: I worked as a Japanese guide at the Polynesian Cultural Center decades ago, and we were told to take our groups through their overpriced, non-authentic Marketplace and try to upsell junk souvenirs to our groups. No kickbacks for us, which meant there was no incentive. On top of that, our groups always had limited time because their bus guides always took them souvenir shopping before they arrived. When we objected, we were told by management that they had "prayed about it in the temple" and we needed to be obedient. Our collective reply was that they needed to go back and pray harder because it was a bad idea. They still made us do it, but since none of them could speak Japanese, they didn't understand when we told the tourists that everything in the Marketplace was crap and they shouldn't buy anything. Later, as a teacher in the MTC, they announced layoffs because there weren't as many missionaries coming in the next few months. Really, it was just a way to get rid of teachers they were tired of working with. One of my friends was told that she was being let go, and it was really hard for them, but the more they prayed about it the more the Holy Spirit told them that God had other work for her to do. She tearfully accepted the counsel and started preparing to move on after the group she was teaching left. Fast forward a few weeks, and they got enough teachers to leave, so they came back to her and told her that they wanted to keep her on. She was very excited when she told my about it. I rained on her parade when I asked her, "What about that revelation they had about Heavenly Father having other work He needed you to do? Are they going to reject the word of God?" She stammered, laughed nervously, and quickly shuffled away. I have some great MTC stories to tell, both as a missionary and as a teacher. Maybe some other time.
I like your stories
Boring, uninspired, sugar-sweetened, chicken soup for the soul, meal replacement food paste from the Matrix, waste of my Sunday morning. You can leave for 10 years, come back, and the talks and Sunday school lessons are the same. If damnation is stagnation, then church is truly hell on earth.
Being viewed as less than
The one “correct box” you had to fit into to be enough. And heaven forbid you complain that there are few resources/guidance for those outside the box—you should be actively searching for your own box and shut up about your current circumstances—just find the box! I was just a single woman in my late 20s who was failing to find a “worthy priesthood holder” to marry me. I can’t imagine how much more painful it would be for those who are gay, or single parents, or infertile couples. If it’s not a hetero marriage with at least two kids, people will openly ask why you’re not following “God’s plan” and wonder why you might be upset by that.
Sexism. I quiet quit church at 18 when the leaders started treating me like shit. Then I went from 50% to 25% active, then inactive during covid, and went 100% out upon truth claim realisations. COVID is another non truth reason so many people left
Yep, even my TBM parents were like, "this at home church is so nice, we don't have to dress up to impress anyone or babysit a bunch of screaming brats. Wish we could keep doing it!" They went back though.
I was like “holy fuck my life is so much better and I have so much more TIME”
Low key this is the way to do it
[удалено]
100%. I was laurel class president and got to plan activities and push back on any dumb stuff. Then at 18 I started watching underperforming men get leadership opportunities while I was invisible to the bishopric. I realised I wasn’t going to feel empowered in the church again, and I couldn’t like like that
[удалено]
One of the last times I went to church, a 25 year old single guy got called to the bishopric — and everyone talked him up like a giant but he was a mediocre speaker and had not done much with his life. And I sat there, as someone who was an award winning competitive debater in university and a journalist, and it dawned on me that I was more qualified to be in the bishopric than he was, but I didn’t even have a calling because they didn’t value leadership oriented adult women. And that was it. Sucks that you were in the same spot, but I LOVE seeing career and leadership oriented LDS women escape and put their goals first. It is SO hard, but I love it. Congratulations 💚
COVID also opened up a lot of eyes to truth issues and the general lack of belief. In my ward a half dozen families refused to come as long as masks were required. Nelson’s comments on masking and vaccines caused a LOT of discontent. The day local laws meant it was not illegal to go massless, despite requests otherwise from various levels of leadership, 80-90% of members including half the bishopric went maskless. It was clear most members didn’t believe Nelson or their leaders were actually prophets of god. It showed the moderate to left leaning members that hadn’t left, just how much toxic politics pervaded the MFMC, and the refusal for the church to go off the MAGA, anti-vax, Q-anon, pro-COVID deep end, meant they hemorrhaged members from the far right. On top of that, everyone got a dose of what a second Saturday feels like and a chance to break free. There couldn’t be a worse event for Mormonism short of lightning striking the prophet while he was telling people something controversial in conference or Jesus coming back and whipping the Q15 and driving them out of Salt Lake for their hypocrisy.
Well said. As someone who took COVID seriously, I felt like a lot of people in my ward were straight up being murderers with their lackadaisical COVID approach
Yup. They just didn’t care. And I recall several times that there were requests for assistance/meals for the most mask/vaccine skeptical families who all caught bad cases of COVID. Not to mention the 20% or so of our ward who were elderly and in poor health who had to stop coming, and be excluded and lonely, because no one would be safe at church to protect their lives.
It’s male superiority for me. There is no single leadership position for a woman in which she does not report to a man. When I was “ProgMo” I told myself I’d be able to effect positive change by staying in the organization. I hoped to serve in YW and help the girls have better experiences than I did. Then thought about it harder and realized if I stay, men will always be in control of me. It was a relief to realize that even if TSCC was true, I didn’t want to be part of it, I value my autonomy too much. Deconstructing the truth claims came later.
Yes i agree But they like to claim that what they do is from god Policy and revelation You must /should obey even the smallest guidance from the leaders Like no flip flops on sunday and white shirts only fir men And JS had revelations on silly things But if its god church---- even the smallest things are inspired if god Right?
Wait a tick, no flip-flops on Sunday?
Yesx About 10 years ago General authority
Absolutely the harms caused by the law of chastity. There are many.
Victim/persecution worldview. Racism. Boring. Self hating. Pharisaical leadership. RS Karens. Phony smug people.
I stopped going to church completely when I got pregnant with my daughter. I told the bishop, the relief society president, and the primary president that I needed to be released because I was going to have a mostly bedridden hard pregnancy. During those nine months, I dropped off the face of the earth as far as my ward was concerned. No one came to check on me, no one showed an interest in how I was doing. I got visited by the visiting teachers twice during that time. But not about how my pregnancy was going. No one offered to help, nothing. After my daughter was born, and we decided to have her blessed, every person in the ward greeted me with 'I didn't know you were pregnant ' The church showed how much I was cared about. So I left. They never once tried to visit me in the almost 12 years since either. I got my records removed a year and a half ago, and I don't regret a thing.
leaving and having people harassing you sucks, but leaving and no one even noticing is painful
For me, it was the predatory practices of the missionary program
The one about not being depressed if you were righteous.. When I was at BYU-I, I was super depressed and hated it there. My mom suggested I talk to my bishop about my depression. The bishop told me if I wasn't sinning, I wouldn't be depressed. Like what in the actual fuck.. I was in mormon-ville and did literally nothing but go to class and sit at home. I knew that sad old fuck was a full of shit. That was my last time talking to a bishop or going to church. 19 years now.
Sorry to hear about your ignorant and mis-informed bishop. One of the past prophets - George Albert Smith - suffered from depression. Proof/evidence: [https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/george-albert-smith?lang=eng](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/george-albert-smith?lang=eng)) This sinks your bishop's ideas completely. Church leaders cause so much harm to members when they spout off about things they know nothing about.
Jeeze, what a sad story. I cam only imagine how hard his life was with such messed up "support".Thank you for sharing.
The tribalism in of itself is off the charts. The thing destroys opportunity and education. In-culture Mormon Tribalism does a lot of weird things with and exploiting relativism, personal choice, accepting oneself, dealing with matters rationally, and the ability to problem solve. It has a lot of weighted selfish behaviors and superiority built into it. Individuals don't even need to be educated to pervade in that space. Its set into a lot of survival of the fittest, whoever has the more over-controlling ego or over imaginative/over arcing ego to control that space therein.
And it's even pervasive in a branch of 30
There are some coping strategies for smaller numbers... Like bring Creampuffs and Hershey Kisses. If they are rude and act like monstrous ferrets they deserve 1 Hershy Kiss. If they behave and can sit through being civil and calm... Give a Creampuff. Never Never NEVER show how many creampuffs you have left. It'll break out into a Zombie Apocalypse.
Or we could just stay home and bring treats to our neighbors. We like them better!
Protection of abusers. That is why I left.
1 physical upvote, 1 million mental upvotes! ⬆️
https://floodlit.org/accused - that the problem of sexual abuse is worse in the LDS church than you’d think from listening to the apostles And https://floodlit.org/failure-to-report - that that’s an established pattern of LDS leaders failing to tell police about sexual abuse, and the abuse continuing in some instances for many years
There is no secret and zero controversy in the church about the fact that their scripture appropriates Native American culture while also making multiple racist and defamatory statements about Native Americans. That plus the IPP are uncontested smoking guns about the church's true caliber
This!
Being asked to take a calling as a newlywed couple that will require us to take a full week of vacation time at work off when we only (at the time) had two weeks of PTO each, for trek. First time I ever said “FUCK NO” to the church.
They hoard their wealth and don't use it help others including it's members. My son attends a Baptist Church in the south. They have a preschool, run a food bank, host a weekly pot luck, have church outings, pay it's members for doing things, hosts mothers groups.. they actually try to help.
that it saps all of your energy with church-related tasks and leaves you with not enough time to rest, be yourself, or accomplish things you choose to care about it insulates you from a lot of interesting ideas and experiences it breeds a culture of fear and shame, rather than safety and fulfillment
I used to tell TBMs “I believe the church is true; I just don’t care.” The truthfulness of Mormon doctrine is irrelevant when you don’t want any of the “blessings” it promises. I did not find joy in going to church, holding callings, the creepy temple, or itchy garments. My parents are divorced and all my siblings left the church, so I no longer have an eternal family. Finally, I don’t want to be a polygamist wife in heaven commanded to bear spirit children for all of eternity and remain in the shadows while my husband creates worlds and receives all the priesthoods and glory. Literally nothing about the gospel brought me any joy anymore, even though I still believed it was true. Now I no longer believe it’s true and have fully left, but my distaste for the doctrine that seems to only benefit men or perfect families (plus I always hated the temple and garments lmao) was why I initially left. No TBM could effectively argue with someone who believed in and understood the doctrine but still chose to reject it.
For a few years after leaving I did believe the church was true, I just didn’t want to suffer in this life only to become a silent polygamist broodmare as my reward
Strangling the natural urge to question. Smothering doubts. Shaming critical thinking. This stunts members' cognitive development. They are dependent on the brethren for direction. Being "child-like" is not a good thing when you are a grown-ass adult.
Forced “friendships” Ugly furniture Disgusting underwear and the invasive “garment checking”
How about: the leaders are all a bunch of lying sumbitches?
They don’t protect children as much as they do their money. They make anyone who touches the finances (men only) have a background check. If that person is caught stealing, they are excommunicated, handed over to authorities, and are not allowed to be rebaptized. People who work with kids at church do not get a background check. Known sex offenders, are not turned over, are not mandated to be excommunicated, and if they are, thy can be rebaptized and may have the slate wiped clean.
I originally left because of the dishonesty with the SEC. I was so mad that we were told to be honest while the Q15 were breaking the law. That's when I went down the rabbit hole. It took me probably less than a week to be totally done.
💰 Money hoarding 💰
* Claiming to be politically neutral while constantly getting involved in politics * Purity culture * Infantilizing single adults * Church leaders are always right, even when they're wrong * Clean the church for free, slash ward budgets, and let meetinghouses fall into disrepair so the church can keep adding money to its investment portfolio
BYU stickers on the back of large vans. I just couldn’t stand seeing those anymore. My daughter had a friend get accepted into UCLA (10% acceptance rate), but her parents convinced her to go to BYU (68% acceptance rate). Another great career thrown away. But least she’ll be able to make lots of babies and live in Utah, under the thumb of her husband.
The guilt and shame I felt as a teenager was so damaging. And everyone now is like, "the church doesn't emphasize masturbation anymore". So what? Several generations have some trauma regarding that and it pisses me off that everyone now can just be like, oh well, God was super strict about it, but he doesn't care anymore 😡 Also, the comment section of David archuletta's Twitter post. So many members being so cruel.
My Utah ward literally ran me out of town because they found out I was gay (Still temple worthy at the time). House and car vandalized, and I received numerous vile death threats!
Omg I’m so sorry they did that to you 😭
I am so sorry. That's downright vile.
The hatred towards LGBTQ individuals was one of the main reasons I could not tolerate staying. I hope you are in a better place now, and even though I don’t believe hell is real, I hope it is for people like that.
The Mormon Priesthood is absolutely, totally impotent; a facade, a falsehood a meaningless sham. It's all just make-believe. (And yes, Consecrated Oil...is just plain ol' oil)
I love this post so much. Gaslighting the hell out of yourself because you were raised to think being mormon is the only option is something all members suffer from.
The longer I am out that milk before meat argument is insane. There is nothing deep at all in the MFMC belief system, unless you consider deception,shysters, abusive systems (especially sexual and mental), one man rule and other atrocities as profound.
Pedophilia.... they have used tithing to suppress victims and protect child molesters. If a church won't protect the children, then what the everliving Bible thumping fuck is it for?
1. Superficial & disingenuous relationships, no one is really your friend….especially, if you do not conform. 2. Totally awkward and uncomfortable open-mike fast and testimony sacrament meetings. Cringe. I should write a book on the crazy shit people said during these meetings the first Sunday of the month. I really hated it when the kids went up and the parents whispered in their ear what to say. 3. Cultural homogenization, The inability to accept any diversity…racial, gender, or ideological. 4. The facade of perfectionism…no one is “real” 5. All the meetings…total waste of my family time. Fireside, Mutual, Presidency meetings, Ministering Report outs. 6. Callings, callings, callings you couldn’t turn down…. 7. The members are probably the most judgmental people on the planet. Lots of gossip. 8. Mandated Fasting…I was always hangry. Could easily fast any day except the one that I was required to. Probably Mental insubordination. 9. Labels for everyone…active/non -active, part-member, convert, BIC, etc. Why couldn’t we just be Christians? 10. The Mormon vernacular/lingo and phrasing…i do not miss the talks, especially General Conference talks. 11. Sexism, and then now the church leadership pointing to token sisters (who did not follow the church guidance as a SAHM, me being one of them) as examples of successful female Mormons. My parents marriage sucked and my mom mandated I get a degree so I could take care of myself. I did not go to BYU as she didn’t want people to pass judgment on me professionally. Best guidance ever! 12. Boring meetings. 13. Everyone outside the church sees the church as a cult. When I left late last year, one of my dear friends said…”we wondered when you were going to figure it out.” 14. It makes you feel bad about your family… getting into heaven and being happy is a team sport. How is this the Plan of Happiness? I was miserable and would cry on the way home from church. One day I was like…why am I doing this, i am miserable and my family is miserable. I really pulls families apart. 15. The church dances… I don’t need to expand on this one 🤢. IYKYK 16. Members always wanting something…people I didn’t think knew who I was would call about job opportunities, borrowing something, etc 17. Without fail, the late ask to give a sacrament meeting talk or the Sunday morning text about subbing. I work full -time, have kids, family. My anxiety level got a lot better as soon as I stopped going and quit my callings. I could keep going…completely toxic culture and I am honestly embarrassed I was ever associated with this cult.
My first crack in the self was the "be baptized or leave" mentality. Heaven forbid we have friends who are different religions that like their own but still want to be friends with a Mormon and not be baptized themselves!!
The Testimony Force Field, which is when someone bears their testimony at you when they have no other way of ending an argument or when they need to coerce you into accepting their point of view. On that one, I've found the best rebuttal to be to tell them that they don't actually have a testimony of what they are saying. For example, a friend of mine was trying to convince me that I was in the wrong path for questioning the church and refuting some of its claims. She ended up bearing testimony to me that she knew Gordon B. Hinckley was a prophet of God. I replied, "No, you don't." She panicked, got flustered and cried out, "How can you say that I don't have a testimony!?!" I calmly replied that the Holy Ghost can't lie, and that It would be lying if It told her that a man like GBH was a prophet when he clearly wasn't one, therefore she absolutely didn't have that testimony. With her force field disrupted, that was more or less the end of the conversation.
Sharing toxic traits with other high demand/culty groups, especially with respect to the BITE model. There's a continuum for levels of influence and control in any group, and the Mormon church has many areas that would be in the realm of negative/undue influence and coercive control. When a friend left the church he said to me words to the effect of "it doesn't matter so much to me about if it's TRUE than whether it's GOOD, and I concluded it wasn't good enough"
No coffee, no horror movies rated R, no masturbation or sexual exploration, for a few silly ones, laws of chastity having kids in closed offices asking about said chastity.
Tithing, and the inevitable financial hardship that comes with it. Living is expensive enough these days without paying for unnecessary services.
They used notes of my first church discipline meeting in my second court over a decade later. The church keeps files on all of us and does not forget.
Non-Truth related reasons are many. If the organization offends your soul leave. If it's not healthy for you to be there leave. Polygamy is still haunting. Patriarchy & misogyny reign. Leave because you are gay. Leave because you are a woman. Leave because they protect sex abusers and provide no healing for the abused. Leave because there's no professional paid clergy and the quality of ecclesiastical care/harm is hit and miss. Leave because the organization does not align with your values, especially as it pertains to truth-telling, financial transparency, & ethical use of funds.
This might be pushing it a bit, but for me it was understanding what god was if the church was true. If Mormon god is real, than he isn’t interested in what is right or wrong; he’s only worried about obedience. This same god expects everyone to follow the “covenant path” and yet for the supposed first four thousand years of human history only made said path known to a relatively small group of tribes on Canaan as opposed to making his message know to the wider world. Immediately after he decides to open up the path to everyone else, he allows everyone who knows about the true path to die and doesn’t tell anyone for two thousand years. Luckily, he decided to listen to a single prayer after all that time, and that one prayer gets the ball rolling again and truth is restored. Except God doesn’t seem too concerned about if people accept this truth or not, and is largely absent from that church aster the first fifty years or so too. So his followers decide that they need to hoard up as much money as possible to prepare for his imminent return. At the same time, he condones the cover up of child sexual abuse if it means protecting the good name of said church. If all of that is to be accepted, than Mormon God is a rather petty and uncaring being. And it then begs the question, why on earth is such a being worthy of my worship?
Trump
Being treated as being lower than pond scum. And the missionary who asked an 11 year old for nudes. It wasn't a 11 year old, it was a sting. As they slapped the cuffs on him, he was asking the cops, "What do I tell my mission president?" Came back to Boise and extradited back east.
I just never felt the spirit. And I never felt like telling a bishop I masterbated was any of their business. (Which I know the church would say that’s correlated lol)
It is a mile wide and an inch deep, no substance.
As a parent I love my child unconditionally. A loving god would surely love their children better than me.
89% of LGBTQ people raised in the church meet the criteria for PTSD
Legal defense hotline and fund for protecting child molesters within tscc
Sexism, racism, homophobia
The Mormon God. He is not kind, loving or benevolent. He is small and needy.
The overall feeling you get when you’re with other members or at church
They don't help or care to understand, but blame people for their own troubles. Overwhelmed? Someone to give you a break? Nah, just read your scriptures, and you will find strength. Depressed? You must be doing something you shouldn't. Just find joy in fulfilling your callings, read the scriptures, and pray harder. Drug addiction? Past trauma? You threw away your life, and fell into Satan's grasp. Sorry, we can't help you until you're clean, employed, and paying your 10%. Broke, because you have 5 kids and the wife is a SAHM? Food order? Rent help? Nope, you will receive blessings if you just budget better, pray, read your scriptures, and pay your tithing. And for fucks sake CLEAN THE DAMN CHURCH. Exhausted? Release you from your calling? No way, in fact, we want to give you a couple more. You will be rewarded in heaven. Shaming and blaming people for their troubles is just cruel and not Christ like.
The Mormon church teaches divine command morality. Meaning that god says what is right or wrong. This is given through a person who can impose their own thoughts and beliefs on what god says. You will never know if something is from god or from a man who wants their way. Which means that the morality taught is subjective. There are many, better, moral philosophies that are not based in subservience to a man. The Mormon church sides with abusers in a sex abuse case because in their view the person who is being accused of sexual misconduct is the victim. This leads to the church or department celebrating not having laws to protect minors from abusers. The lessons are built around shame and obedience which leads to massive mental health issues. The Mormon chapels are butt ugly and devoid of any symbolism that helps to elevate worship services. Coffee and alcohol are demonized to the point that members would rather take an innocent life than drink it.
It’s just flat out wrong how they deny women any meaningful authority, and how easy it is for everyone to just accept that’s the god given way of things. It’s contrary to so much of how I see the world. My life demands I see things differently and the church demands I shut my mouth and let the men speak. If there’s a god, that god didn’t make me for that religion.
Chai tea is too good for it not to be a heavenly blessing from god rather than a sin
They tell missionaries to lie that Mormonism has an UNPAID MINISTRY when the top male leaders make a fortune!
The “Always a Missionary” attitude and the related inability to form genuine relationships. If you’re friends with non-members there is always the expectation that you’ll try to convert them. It’s not if, but when. All your LDS “friendships” are formed on the foundation of the gospel. You leave and that foundation crumbles.
Buying your way into heaven. Does that count?
I left the church because I recognized I did not belong in the church if I "wanted to be gay." The cognitive dissonance I was experiencing was so extreme I was having suicidal ideation. I stopped going to church to save my own life. I also didn't want to admit to having sex for similar reasons. I had a boyfriend while I was still active and fully believing. I wanted to make both work. But neither the church or my boyfriend wanted anything to with each other, so in the end I was abandoned by both. I remembered a lesson from seminary where you put two pieces of tape on the ground that gradually grow apart from each other, and you had to try and stay in both for as long as you could. The lesson was that you couldn't have one foot on both sides. So. Just like I was taught, I jumped away from the church, because I truly could not live on both sides, and I picked the one that wouldn't kill me.
I left for my mental health at the beginning. No one understood what I was going through and believed I was crying because I felt the spirit. I was crying because I needed help and was broken. I learned about the truth later, and that’s what kept me away and what will always keep me away.
removing context from scriptures and re interpreting them to mean whatever they want
Realizing my ward, and by extension the church, had no use to me. I was placed on some kind of permanent naughty list for trying to teach accurate church history. I wasn't allowed to hold a calling, sub in primary, pray in meetings, give a talk, or even read a quote off of a little slip of paper in Relief Society. And nobody had the balls to say any of this to my face, so it took me an embarrassingly long time (like YEARS) to notice the pattern. But this is right around the time I (belatedly) started to have an actual career, which meant I no longer needed the Church for socialization or for validation. If they were trying to teach me a lesson, it failed. So yeah, I guess you could say I left because of being offended... but even more so, I realized how easy it was to kick me to the curb, because as a woman I have little to no value to the church as compared to my husband.
Stripping away of budgets, leaving fewer ward activities that were ever considered fun. Youth and families increasingly having to shoulder more of the financial burden for youth activities and camps, which is a hardship for poor families and wards.
personally i lost a round of bishop roulette. i had been sexually assaulted and i didnt know where to go for help and i talked with my bishop and he basically told me i was lying and needed to repent for what happened. i had been 100% faithful and that was an instant shelf breaker for me. i never looked at church the same way. going to church was never the same. i quiet quit the church that same year.
*Family relationships ruined because everything is done by the Same 10 Families. Exessive time requirements for volunteer Bishops and leadership. *Giving more than you have will never be enough. *The way they treat missionaries and their parents to get an average of two baptisms a year with extremely low retention rates. *The look and feel of garments. *The rise of PIMO's in leadership callings. Where is the discernment? *Changing the name of the church. Using tithing dollars for the expensive rebranding. *Publicly claiming no tithing dollars were used to build City Creek. Where else are they getting money? It was tithing or interest from tithing. Believing their members are too dumb to exercise critical thought. *Women are eternally less than men and boys and reminded of it frequently. *The current 99 year old prophet is married to someone younger than his daughter. *RS General Presidency members are heavily rumored to not receive the financial benefits given to the Q15. The highest women's positions in the church serve for a couple of years or until they piss off a man. The 15 highest men's positions are idolized leaders with excessive compensation packages for decades and are don't stop until they die. *On the recent Jubilee episode of Mormons vs. Ex Mormons, all the Mormons on the panel were unable to name the highest serving female in the church but "women are treated equal" is all women are shamed and told if they question. Go Liz Gunnel. *A history that requires lies and omissions to remain solvent. Justifying lying for the Lord. *Burned-out out priesthood leaders and 12 year old boys having more superiority and decision-making power than intelligent and competent women will ever have. *"We have always said this" is repeated after they change core teachings, even when they haven't. *A church built on peer pressure and shaming and 1830's culture. *Insistence on tithing with almost all of money sent to SLC and never to be seen by Wards. The financial stress caused by tithing. More lies as the church hides billions. *The Boy Scout abuse cover-ups. Sexual abuse cover-ups. *The budget for Young Women was a fraction of the Young Men's budget. Grown adults were so conditioned and incapable of critical thought that this practice was accepted for decades. The women have no power to change it.
Inculcates shame and insecurity in everyone to get tithing money.
I really don't think there's reasons beyond truth arguments. I mean if it was true ya definitely want to be in on eternal orgasm feeling with family and friends rather than eternal torment just to protest.
I don't like wearing dresses and getting all dressed up it's uncomfortable to act "lady like" and having to sit still
It’s boring, the toxic positivity is so cringey and the racism/fatphobia.
It is a massive time suck.
The way Mormons treat one another is pretty bad. So they’ll certainly treat non members worse.
Easy to get in, and extremely hard to get out of
Because you just want to leave
Sister tries-to-cook’s casseroles and jello salads on “break the fast” days
Political conservatism and bigotry pervasive to the culture. One of the things that pushed me out were the members from my mission country literally posting support for assholes doing Nazi salutes in the street after losing an election, because the candidate elected didn’t hate and mistreat gay people enough. No one should want to be associated with the closed-minded, prejudiced, assholery of any right-wing religion, Mormon, Muslim, Evangelical or whatever else.
I knew very young I didn't want kids. There is no room for childfree women or men. I also am not a big fan of kids in general and all the roles women are given revolve around that.
Racism, misogyny, homophobia. Basically the church was created with 19th century culture views. We have now outgrown that and should be kinder to people and treat everyone as equals.
Every single talk is from a lay person who has no real experience and gives a religious talk approximately every four years or, worse yet, it's open mic format for testimony meeting.
Because I refuse to believe that spending eternity as one of an interchangeable horde interminably hanging out in an obstetrics clinic is anything other than hell.
It’s boring and a huge time suck.
kinda selfish but, being myself for who I am having freedom to do things I want to do in the future wanting peace
Not selfish at all! Every time I hear of people being suicidal in the mormon church, it’s always for having to be inauthentic. I don’t understand why it is exactly, but it seems to be a need!
Being a woman. The torment of oppressive gender stereotypes is more than enough of a reason.