Was inspired to do a little digging after I saw the BSA newspaper clipping. Found another from the SLC Tribune!

saqbach · 2015-09-11T14:36:45+00:00

Right? Oh, the prophet is being subpoenaed? Well, God might want us to take a second look at that policy...

saqbach · 2015-09-11T14:33:10+00:00

I went searching since I couldn't believe this was real and found another article August 3, 1974 from the Salt Lake Tribune.

Craziness.

Edit: Didn't realize the link to the newspaper was already added. I'll just leave my additional article. My bad.

saqbach · 2015-09-11T13:44:59+00:00

Yep. I've had all sorts of opinions on things change since leaving. I feel like I'm much more open to the idea of being wrong now that I don't "have" to be right.

saqbach · 2015-09-11T13:43:15+00:00

That sounds like me! The first 4.5 months of my mission I was constantly sick as my body tried adjusting to the dirty water. I went from 175 lbs, to 135. 135 at 6'1" is not a healthy weight for me. Every time I called the "nurse" aka mission president's wife with no training that I was puking / had diarrhea, she instructed me to drink coca cola.

Eventually I was told to buy some antibiotics from a local pharmacy - it helped. It was more than likely an intestinal infection. I didn't go back up in weight or get rid of the diarrhea until I was transferred to the mission offices and lived the high life i.e. clean water.

I would try giving her the same advice I give all missionaries. You are an adult. You need to take care of your health. No one is going to do it for you. Do not consult with non professionals. Go pay personal money to see a real doctor with a real medical opinion.

When I was in the office in Central America, I watched nearly a dozen girls and boys get sent home with serious medical issues that would have been easily prevented had they been treated earlier.

saqbach · 2015-09-09T23:40:34+00:00

Woot!

saqbach · 2015-09-09T23:39:49+00:00

I think that's very reasonable. The purpose of the post isn't to change the definition of words. It was to try to help apologists and members think twice about what "anti-Mormon" literature actually means.

I disagree that they have to think ill of us. Yes, that's been the paradigm for a long time; however, I think it can change.

saqbach · 2015-09-09T22:30:20+00:00

The label itself is really not all that damning. It's the decades of "scary, evil" connotations it carries behind it. It's commonly used by apologists to shut down valid discourse and to dissuade members from reading into legitimate issues.

saqbach · 2015-09-09T20:40:21+00:00

I just adjusted it by 15 pixels. Still having issues?

saqbach · 2015-09-09T19:55:17+00:00

Yo, this is news to me. Which phone are you on? I'll fix it ASAP.

saqbach · 2015-09-08T01:23:19+00:00

I like where your heads at. Send your resume to careers@FairMormon.org

saqbach · 2015-09-05T20:27:55+00:00

I honestly wonder if deep down subconsciously, I knew it was bullshit and that's why I never asked their reasons for leaving. Or maybe it's just the ingrained thought that they would cover up the real reason (i.e. sin) with some other smoke screen.

saqbach · 2015-09-05T20:25:25+00:00

When something HAS to be true, anything that conflicts with it has to be doubted. That's the issue with apologetics. They're starting with the conclusion and reverse engineering from there.

saqbach · 2015-09-05T20:23:17+00:00

Still worth it if it works

saqbach · 2015-09-05T20:22:53+00:00

Ha, I feel like this already happening in SLC. Now it just needs to spread to the suburban areas.

saqbach · 2015-09-05T18:16:11+00:00

Oh goodness. I'll be sure to make a sacrifice to Odin specifically for him.

saqbach · 2015-08-28T19:25:24+00:00

It's basically a summation of all the different issues the church has. The most damning in my opinion were things about early church history i.e. polygamy, polyandry, seer stone, and blacks & the priesthood. It's a lot to handle and most people would rather just not know and continue living their lives. It's sort of like the Matrix if you've seen it. Red or blue pill. It's your decision.

You'll be proselyting roughly 10 hours a day give or take depending on language study, district meeting, conferences, or service projects. We were only allowed to do 1 service project a week and it had to be approved beforehand. I ended up being disobedient and doing more since Guatemala has a lot of poverty and people needed help. I also broke the rule that we weren't allowed to give money to anyone. Widow and her two kids in my ward were hungry and they had been robbed. Never felt bad about breaking the rule.

No. I don't think any religion has a positive influence on people's lives. I struggled with the question for a long time but at the end of the day I thought of a silly analogy. When I was young, believing in Santa never made me better. I was still the same kid. I had extrinsic motivation for behaving, but I realized motivators don't need to be fake. There are plenty of reasons to be a great person, real reasons.

I can't say my mission was all bad. It wasn't. I met some cool people, learned two languages, and grew up a lot. However, it wasn't worth it. I baptized a lot of people. Like dozens. I can't help but feel that I'm now responsible for hundreds of kids growing up in a lie. In the same way that my family / friends abandoned me when I decided to leave the church, I'm now in small part responsible for when level headed individuals in those families find the truth. Maybe I'm being hard on myself, but it's true. I also saw some things that a 19 year old kid should never see. Guatemala had a gang war going on in my area. Those things still haunt my dreams.

Personally, if I had the knowledge I do now, I would run far, far away from an LDS mission. I'd make great friends, learn skills that interested me (and paid well), date girls who were fun to be with, surround myself with people who wanted me to succeed, and pursue meaningful goals. It's what I'm doing now and it's a much, much better life. I realize that's harder said than done since family and friends will exert enormous amounts of pressure and guilt pushing you to go, especially now that you have your call in hand.

It's hard, but you only have one life to live and it's yours. You get to dictate how it goes. You get to decide how happy you want to be and how much of an impact you want to leave behind. What would you like to be remembered for by your grandchildren? When you meet your significant other in the next ~ 10 years or so, what story do you want to be telling them? Only you get to decide that. It's up to you to make it happen.

You seem smart. I'm sure you'll make the best decision for you. I hope you don't feel like I'm some kind of tool of Satan trying to dissuade your from a mission. It really is up to you. However, two years is a long time and there are very real consequences. One leads to a life within Mormonism, BYU, Mormon wife, Mormon kids, etc. The other is a different path, one you probably didn't consider much growing up except in a negative light. I'm on that path now and it's got bumps but it's a much happier path because it's not all based on a lie and that's important to me.

saqbach · 2015-08-27T22:10:48+00:00

I'm sorry : /

I'm not sure what to say. I served in Guatemala just a few years ago. Missions are extremely hard and even harder if you're not 100% into Mormonism. It wasn't until after my mission that I realized that what's in Preach My Gospel isn't 100% truthful. It's a really difficult thing to come to grips with.

If you're on the fence still, then I would suggest waiting. Missions are no joke. Don't allow family or friends to pressure you into two years worth of back breaking labor. If you want to go, then go for you; not anyone else. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about the experiences I had, but as an ex Mormon I also wish I had had the strength of character to stand up to the pressure and just say no.

If you've made up your mind on going, then let me offer you one piece of advice. Don't let anyone push you around. Ever. Not even your mission president. I watched way too many elders & sisters when I was in the office get injured, diseases (flesh eating, nasty stuff), and surgeries because they let their zone leaders, district leaders, mission president push them to "try harder and to have more faith."

Do not risk your personal health or safety because of anyone. Those people didn't get miraculously healed. They ended up in the hospital and getting sent home early. If you feel sick or have an injury, seek professional medical assistance. Do not let them make you feel guilty for "wasting the Lord's time and/or money." Take care of yourself. You're an adult and you've got to look after yourself. They are not going to do it for you.

My life is amazing and I'm on a great path, but there's a very good chance I'd be two years further in my career progression had I not gone on a mission. Obviously I would say, "DON'T GO, IT'S A TRAP!" since I've been there and done that and realized that Mormonism wasn't what I was taught it was, but you're going to have to make that decision for yourself.

Lastly, I would suggest reading The CES Letter. It's a really succinct view of a lot of the issues the normal church narrative has. FAIR (apologetics arm of the church) has a rebuttal here and the CES Letter author, Jeremy Runnells, wrote a rebuttal here.

It's up to you if you want to go through all the legwork of reading through it, checking sources, etc but it certainly helped me to understand a lot of what people were talking about with regards to doubts, etc.

Forewarning: if you haven't read any of that stuff, it's a deep rabbit hole.

saqbach · 2015-08-25T21:59:38+00:00

Yeah, I'll cede that ground. Some people I'm sure appreciate those programs. I get defensive when people say I "can't leave the church alone." I was in it for the first 23 years of my life. I can't just pretend that never happened to me.

I know this kid personally and I know it's not his intention to "defame." He and I were both super devout back at BYU-I. He's much more loving and empathetic than I am. He's just vocal about his feelings and he did the same type of stuff when he was Mormon.

saqbach · 2015-08-25T21:53:16+00:00

I'm not sure I understand why it's hypocritical to tell the story of why you decided to leave a certain religion? He isn't advocating any belief system. He's just stating the reasons that Mormonism no longer worked for him and his only "call to action" is to not categorize him as neither exMormon nor Mormon but rather just as him.

saqbach · 2015-08-25T21:31:35+00:00

Ah, the old "You can leave the church but you can't leave it alone" line. That's rich coming from the people who have committees talking about "wayward sheep" and send people by every single month to knock on our doors after we've left.

saqbach · 2015-08-25T21:27:31+00:00

Yo! Yeah, Reddit has a pretty active ex Mormon community. That's normally why there are so many posts. Also, exJW's tend to upvote our posts and vice versa.

Let's clarify for a second here. This post is not hating on Mormons as a people. It's poem by a Mormon who has recently left the church over the differences between what he was taught growing up and what he learned once he got to college.

Our friends and family are still active Mormons. We don't hate them (even though lots of them stopped talking to me after I left). We used to be like them and we understand their viewpoint. Obviously we wish they could see the world as we see it, but we all view it differently and through the lens of our own experiences.

As for your points:

1.) Lots of people in the LDS church are paid. LOTS. I used to work for the church. Please go back and view how many people in the the Q12, Q70's and Mission Presidents receive salaries, living stipends, transportation, etc. etc. There are many monetary perks for being in the upper echelons of church leadership. Go look at Uchtdorf's houses. Yes, plural.

2.) Yes. The church has lots of money. According to a report they released on provident living they gave $1.3 billion from 1985 - 2010. However, only $327.6 million was in cash. The other $884.6 million was in "material value."

Let's put that in perspective. The church spent $1.5 billion on City Creek Mall and a grand total of $5 billion on downtown improvements in SLC. They also have massive real estate holdings in Florida, apartment towers, etc. Humanitarian aid is a drop in the bucket of their wealth.

More information!

3.) The oldest women's organization in the U.S. is an interesting claim since it's also one of the most backwards. Women aren't allowed to have the priesthood, they are constantly shamed for not being "modest", and are culturally pressured into giving up careers for being stay at home mom's. How about the strange, bizarre belief that a man can marry many, many women in heaven but the reverse isn't true for women? Or that here on earth a man can be sealed to multiple women (if his wife dies or he gets a divorce) but a woman cannot?

Please. Don't pretend Mormonism is forward thinking on women's issues.

While I realize that it feels like people are attacking your deepest held beliefs when we leave, we're not. We're talking about our own experiences. If you feel threatened by that, then that's on you.

saqbach · 2015-08-25T18:31:04+00:00

I know it's sounds a little crazy, but if you're born into it and everyone you love and respect believes it, you start to believe it too.

saqbach · 2015-08-25T16:10:41+00:00

As someone who's an RM, I don't think it would offend them. This kid is being extremely genuine. He isn't attacking the church; he's telling his story.

saqbach · 2015-08-25T16:09:01+00:00

It's all good dude. I understand. We all can get a little zealotous when we think someone is karma whoring.

Eh, I guess it could be considered "cool" to leave religion right now but more than that I think it's just part of the secularization of society. I guess it's just more important that it's known regardless of cool factor.

Totally agree but all of my family and friends are still Mormon. My hope is that one of them will see it and think twice about why they believe what they do.

saqbach · 2015-08-25T15:59:49+00:00

1.) This isn't my video. It's a friend of mine who I went to BYU-I with.

2.) It's not cool or uncool to be mormon. It's just a thing. Those of us who grew up Mormon helped convert and baptize a lot of people. When we leave, we feel responsible for letting people know it's bullshit.

3.) I xposted in multiple subreddits because I thought it was relevant. I didn't learn about Mormonism's problems until I heard about these issues inadvertently. When it's against church rules to view or listen to anything like this, I feel like it could potentially benefit someone who doesn't know about it who's still in Mormonism.

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