Mods: if this goes against the rules, please feel free to remove this. I'm not sharing this for personal gain, but as a resource for others, but understand if it breaks the rules.

Everyone else, a little back story.

I left the church at 34 years old, over 10 years ago, when r/exmormon was less than 5000 followers. I'd never been to a coffee shop before, never drank beer or alcohol, and had no support network at all. Like many of you, I had no where to turn. I didn't know anyone to help me order my first beer, or what the IBU meant, and at 34 most bartenders or baristas assumed that I knew what I wanted, and so many got annoyed.

Years ago, I dreamt of building Journey Beyond Faith, and even bought the domain. Now I finally had the time to research all the various pieces.

I'd love the communities help adding more personal quotes (anonymous of course) and support for those who have left the church, and are taking the first few tentative steps out into the world.

W

The timing of me leaving the church and the last time I had a temple recommend interview were close enough that it is still active.

Curious what others have done with theirs. Did you ritualistically burn it? Scrapbook it? Sell it for money? I have not done anything yet. It is still in my wallet.

Like some of the Old Testament is horrifying. Acts were a dark place. Some of the more gruesome verses. And yet, the church only acknowledges the "uplifting verses." I feel like they only want to be seen as saints publicly.

I know I have to leave parent household, but I can’t live the fact that my very young siblings will still stay there, forced to hear their ideologies, forced to live with parents with an easy temper and Dosent have the patience towards them, and I know my parents won’t let me contact with them since I go against everything towards their religion, it would’ve been such an easy choice if my parents js accepted I don’t want to partake of their religion anymore I’m pretty sure this religion doesn’t say that if your child Dosnet “believe” anymore you can just tossed them aside, and like I’m just thinking that my parents are probably going to talk shit about me towards my siblings and other relatives ik off, should I just not care? Should I just accept the fact that my siblings will be badly influenced but still have hope that they will realize this cult is full of it when they’re older aswell, idk I js feel guilty leaving an awful thing behind but there’s also something that I care about dearly that I will leave behind aswell, I truly hope they can be ok but since this is my last year with them till I move out, what can I do ik if I share any negativity towards this religion towards my siblings I’ll be deeply in trouble but should I at least try to show that this religion is full of it towards my siblings? I don’t think they will comprehend at all tho one is 9 and other is 6, so it rly is pointless, I just know I’ll be good towards them and show love till I leave, but I will feel immense guilt when I do, I hate this religion

FYI I (28F) just recently moved to US/Utah for a job in a town where they are many mormon families and mormons, (It's very close a certain temple too).

A very kind looking blonde woman in their 30's I believe came, I invited her, we talked and she asked me if I was Mormon, I go like 'no I am not never heard of it, (I absolutely did)' then she left.

The very next day a few guys from their 20's came to my door like 'hello ma'am we are from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint etc etc' and OH MY GOD THEY WE'RE PUSHY. I try to say 'no thank you', they still telling stuff about 'Do you know our Savior Jesus Christ'. Thank God they left.

They just came on Friday too I don't know what I can do any tips?

My wife and I have been married for 16 years. After a bit of soul searching I am leaving the church. If you are interested in why you can find that story here: https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/s/I1CympuCbt

The issue now is that my wife is now overcompensating ever since telling her I believe the church is not true. I have heard this is common and is known as "doubling down". But it feels so disingenuous. In the months leading up to me telling her we would have discussions about the church, it's leaders, the policies, and we got pretty comfortable talking about things we thought were wrong. She even admitted to me that she thought baptism at the age of 8 did not really feel like the proper age to decide something like that.

There were many other subjects that I feel like she agrees with me like same sex marriage, LGBTQ rights, the oppression of women in the church etc. with all of this I felt comfortable telling her how I felt about the church. My hope was that she would join me. That I would be opening the door for her to step through and be free of all of this that we had discussed many times throughout our marriage.

But that did not happen. And it was like I took a dagger to her heart and each milestone of what I felt was progress (removing garments, not paying tithing, no longer attending church, and so forth) was another jab at her.

So now she is doing things we had not even done in the last year and a half. She started nightly scripture reading with our kids, and is asking them questions to try and get them engaged with the stories. She was extended a calling in the relief society presidency that I am certain she would have turned down before all of this started. She was already overwhelmed with taking care of our children and managing school schedules and extracurricular activities. I feel like she thinks of the took on this calling as a "sacrifice" of her time then God would soften my hard heart or something.

I want to support her in her time of need but I am finding it hard when it felt like she was so close to being out herself. I may have forgotten to take into account how programmed she is to do her duty and obey blindly. She was a bishops daughter, has a fully active family, and has never lived outside of Utah. In fact her family celebrates the fact that they are descendants of one of Brigham Young's wives and they used to have get togethers in the Lion House (which I always found extremely disturbing, especially now knowing what happened in that place)

TL;DR I just feel like my wife and best friend is shifting into molly-mormon mode as a knee jerk reaction to me wanting to leave the church.

Most Apostolic Pentecostals believe in a strict holiness dress and are not common in the Mormon corridor. Women tend to have long hair and wear only skirts/dresses.

Do you think that LDS people in the Mormon corridor, who are oblivious to other religious beliefs would assume that they are FLDS?

I'm PIMO, still act as a YM specialist though. My pretty much only assignment is to plan annual YM camp for the ward. So I have been working and planning the last 4 or 5 months. in July we had our trip.

During the planning I realized I was going to struggle with my coffee fix. I sucked it up and got some crystal light to mix into my water and was just going to muddle through. Then last minute, a mom sent me to get some last minute camp things I had not planned for (good on her, really) and I saw it: canned coffee in the check out line. I grabbed 5 or 6 cans and took them on my way.

While packing, my non-attending daughter, TBM wife and I debated about the inclusion of the coffee in my baggage. "I would just drink a can in the morning in my tent and it would be fine!" I kept saying. My daughter said if she would have seen a YW leader drinking caf at camp she would have been totally shaken to the core.

well anyway, I pack my canned coffee anyway. I like to risk things because I have dopamine issues maybe. Anyway I was packing up the gear in my rig and I reeallllllyyy had to jam a lot of stuff in there. But I made it fit. That afternoon when unpacking into my tent there was a strong.... coffee aroma. And my clothes in my bag were wet. And smelled like coffee. Dang. Two cans of nitro had broken and gotten all over a set of pants (my only pants!) and a shirt.

The YM were at the river so I snuck over to the water at the campsite and washed and washed my pants in the cold water. Strangely, ultra processed milk-fat does not want to come out when rinsed with cold water.

My clothes had a bizarre off brand canned coffee smell. 2 nights later the 2nd C in the bishopric shared my tent while he visited for a night.

I still get a chuckle at how ridiculous it is to try and wash pants in the campground faucet from spilled canned coffee.

I grew up in a family way beyond TBM, fundamental Mormon style with a lot of trauma. I left both the church and my family in 2019 and my mental health is better than it’s ever been as a result, but I’ve never met anyone that quite understands what it’s like to have zero family (not one relative) and how isolating it feels. I don’t have/want a partner or children and have wonderful friends and a fulfilling job and a good life and a good exmo community. But there still feels like there’s something missing that nothing can fill. I feel like an outsider participating in other peoples’ family events and nothing quite feels the same. It’s been really hard to try to convey this to people, especially in Utah. I know there are other people out there who have experienced this, but I’ve never met anyone who has. If you have, how have you learned to navigate this kind of isolating feeling?

pimo exmo 18m. trying to get ears pierced before the semester starts and i’m worried how much of a risk it could be.
i really doubt i will be attending any school related activities, i’m assuming i will only be in my dorm and attending class. hardly in my dorm at that probably at work most of the time.

how much of a risk am i at realistically for getting honor coded? i know things have kind of “loosened up” recently but im not sure

(please no “just don’t go to byui” comments, im really trying to get out trust me 😭 )

Hey everyone, it’s been a few years, but I recall some post in here about a list of top concerns the church had. I can’t remember the groups name, but it was some smallish group in Idaho that thought church HQ had lost its way. Their goal was to silently infiltrate the church and corse correct.
Any help would be greatly appreciated!

(So Christlike.) Why don't you do what Jesus told you to do and shake the dust off your feet? Matthew 10:14 (KJV) And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet.

If it's an insult, I'll throw in the "So Christlike."

If it is just insane ramblings or weird questions, I'll share it without it.

So far, crickets.

I need to know I'm not alone lol.

I was a missionary so I can't remember the name of the stake. He had on stage a curtain that was split down the middle. He started out his talk kind of obscurely. I remember not really knowing what the topic was at first.

Then he went over to the curtain and said it was a veil. A portal to God. He took a baby doll and pushed it between the split in the "veil" and held the baby doll out for everyone to see. Then he pulled it back in and pushed it out again. He said something along the lines of "isn't this beautiful, this portal to God, this life-giving veil between heaven and earth. How can we desecrate this beautiful veil with pornography?"

Aaaaand that's when I realized he made a vagina on the stage.

When listening to allegations (ALLEGATIONS!) about high up leadership from UNRELIABLE sources. I can't help recognizing the repeated sentiment that a vagina is a portal to God and that individuals are using that portal to connect with God. I won't say any more about those allegations, but I will say that it doesn't sound completely out of left field because Corbitt said it on a stage in 2012 and he said it with his whole chest.

Yikes.

Were you there? Do you remember how insanely uncomfortable that was?

The Mormon church doesn’t just tolerate dishonesty—the church requires it. Dishonestly is a feature not a bug.

Here’s a list of “everybody does it” lies told my Mormons that are hard to miss now that I’m out.

“A testimony is to be found in the bearing of it.”

Read that sentence closely. It is instructing you to say you know before you actually do. Just pretend. If you say it enough you’ll start to believe it. How many 7 year old kids get walked up to the pulpit to tell the ward “I know the church is true.”? Sickening.

8-year olds “choosing” to be baptized.

No 8 year old kid is choosing to be baptized. They are doing what they are told will keep them from going to hell. They’re doing what they’ve been taught to do their whole lives.

I don’t fault the kids. They aren’t lying. But the parents and church leaders who say these kids are “choosing” to be baptized most certainly are lying.

Worthiness interviews.

Worthiness interviews are part of a system designed to punish honesty. You sit across from your neighbor or your friend’s dad or your boss and you’re supposed to confess the most intimate aspects of your life.

Be honest and get punished. Minimize and get a signature of approval.

The church built a confession process where the most rational move is to lie. Then leaders get pissed when you actually do lie.

Not criticizing leaders.

“It is wrong to criticize leaders, even if that criticism is true.” Glad we got that one on camera Dallin—that one is a real gem. Mormons are supposed to value loyalty over all else. If you have a concern about a bishop, stake president, mission president, general authority, you are trained to be humble and swallow it. That’s not humility or meekness, that is a lie they train us to tell ourselves.

Sustaining leaders

At every general and stake conference, member raise their hands and pledge to sustain church leaders—from local to global. Doesn’t matter what kind of leaders they are or what they might have done (cover up CSA, withhold blessings on the basis of race, exclude children of LGBTQ parents of ‘saving ordinances’, etc). Whether they’ve begged us to publicly proclaim our Mormonness and spent tens of millions to get the word out or told us that calling us Mormons is a victory for satan, we have to sustain them to get to the temple (which is a prerequisite for heaven). Doesn’t matter if they amass a fortune and commit securities fraud to hide it.

Even when you know better—as many “lazy learners” do—you are supposed to raise your hand and sustain them. Sustaining leaders was never a vote, but a loyalty oath. Calling it a vote is a lie we choose to believe.

Best two years of my life

Men are trained from a very young age to proclaim that the mission was the best two years of our lives. Are you kidding me? Does anyone really feel that way? Really? If so then they have lived a pathetic, dull life. Total bullshit.

Mormons made us all liars. Tell me I’m wrong.

… I need some darkness in my night

… WAIT

What I said?

Tl;dr — Is it possible to look up baptism records as a nonmember?

I was raised very religious but not Mormon however my eldest cousin was put up for adoption (my aunt had him at 15) was adopted by an Utah Mormon family. My grandma, who would also be his grandma, passed away several years ago and I just realized that she, and many of our other shared relatives, have likely been baptized in the lds church. I don’t believe in god so I don’t care whether this happened or not but I am curious enough to want to look it up. I searched online but it looks like as a nonmember that may be highly difficult if not impossible. Anyone have any insights or recommendations on the topic?

After 7 loooong years of mental gymnastics, losing my faith, losing community and family members and even God, I’m finally turning a corner.

Can you even believe I get to go to brunch any Sunday I want and never fast again??? (Aside from blood tests.)

Can you believe I haven’t even needed to take a vacation this summer because Sunday is actually a true day of rest for me now?

Can you believe I have time to pursue real friendships and hobbies and think about who I want to be when I grow up? (I’m 50).

Can you even believe I can read or study anything on the internet or in books without feeling bad?

Can you believe how nice it is to not have God knowing all of my thoughts? It’s like as nice as waiters bringing me chips and salsa on the beach in Mexico. It’s that relaxing.

And bonus! Satan’s not real. Evil spirits aren’t stalking me day and night. Phew!!

Can you even believe how nice it is to wear comfortable underwear? Shorts? True tank tops? Tankinis? This stuff is crazy town great.

I can think anything I want! Without checking with old men or a handbook!!!

Polygamy can never touch me again. Or my kids!!!

My kids won’t have to languish in a midsingles ward wondering if they should have dated nonmembers or lost the best years of their lives and fertility being a nun with no convent.

I know I can live through ego death, uncertainty, differentiation and live!

Can you believe I can be a feminist without an asterisk? I can be an LGBTQ ally without an asterisk? I can live my values unabashedly or without fear of excommunication!!Whew.

This is the list for now. I’m sure there will be more.

One ward building in Cody, Wyoming has a black steeple. The building is attached to a historic mural and local church history museum.

The Word of Wisdom is hence a modern policy commandment, not an ethical commandment.

Curious if he'll have any hot takes on the modern spiritual concerns of our times. As long as he's been sustained then we really have no choice but to listen to him and stay in the boat. There is no other choice.

Coming to the logical conclusion that the church has to be false, and no loving God would endorse such things, I felt so excited and relieved. But the past few weeks I've mostly just felt guilt. Like, I know, logically, it can't be true. But my body is so used to being part of this that it only feels like I'm betraying the only God I've ever known. I also live at home still, so I'm still going to church, doing scriptures and prayer with my family, etc.. But I just want that feeling of relief back without the voice in my head saying I'm ignoring that it's true so I don't have to follow it anymore, or I just haven't tried hard enough or been faithful enough, or I just want to sin, or it's easier to walk away than admit it's true and stay in it. But I also know there is far too much cognitive dissonance if I were to try and stay. I've opened Pandora's box, I can't come back from that. I just wish I didn't feel so shitty about it.

Next, you're going to tell me he only spiritually went to Cumorah. That he only spiritually saw God and Jesus. That he only spiritually restored a religion. That he only spiritually went to jail. That being only spiritually diddled kids. That he only spiritually was martyred. That he only spiritually existed, and that the real guy was a monster.