We have some questions.

1. This may seem trivial, but when do Mormons go to their church.
They seem to close up their home “tight” on Sundays and hardly ever
come outside on Sundays.

2. What holidays do they celebrate?

3. What do Mormons teach their kids?

4. What do Mormons think of Christians?
We know they call themselves Christians…
but by now it should be obvious to them that we are somehow
“different”. Many of our neighbors on this street are not
Christians. We probably stand out “like a sore thumb”.

5. Does anyone have any thoughts or suggestions on how we can
build a friendly relationship with this family? We’d like to
be good neighbors with them.

6. The kids seldom smile much less laugh.
Is this something that stems from teachings
in Mormonism?

I will start by saying if you haven’t visited the Main Street Plaza, please check it out.
The bloggers there are very active and have been a great source for me in my dealings with leaving the church.

Now, on to your comment…

I did not grow up LDS as you may already know, and neither did my wife, but your story is very familiar to me through close friends who have gone and are still going through the same struggles as you are.

Since I wouldn’t even dare to give you advice on your relationship with your wife, I can only give you a little more detail into how things played out in my life when I decided to leave.
My initial reaction (and a common one) was to “help” my wife see things the same way I was seeing them. I wanted her to understand and question her beliefs aggressively and, most of all, I wanted her to come to the same conclusions to which I had come.
I would then get frustrated when she didn’t see things the same way I did and arguments would ensue.

It’s been over 2 years since I’ve left the church. I’m open about it to anyone who asks and I enjoy an argument or two with a selected group, but I am very much more careful now about with whom I share my views. My wife and I rarely talk about religion anymore, but she still shares her stories with me about her YW’s or any ward drama that happens to be going on.

It sounds like you could stand to lose a lot and I’m more and more convinced now that you’d gain very little in return by being totally honest… at least right away.
I think the main thing you should want your family to understand is that we all have need to believe or not believe on our own terms. Heck, you would even be able to find scripture to support that argument. It is specially important to your children that you be as honest as you can with them, without going into details about the issues that might aggravate your relationship with your spouse.

By you supporting your wife in her personal beliefs now, you would, in my opinion, make it easier for her to accept your new views in the future.
You are definitely not alone in this and I hope you find that your new-found enlightenment and intellectual honesty will make you a better person and an even better parent to your children.

I hope you stick around and feel free to drop me an email at livingwithmormons@gmail.com.

I sincerely wish you the best in this stage of your life.

Cheers.

My wife and I have been together for 25 years. 6 kids. Met at BYU. The typical Mormon love story. I have been giving credence to my doubts for quite a while now, and at 44 years old, have watched the labels I’ve given myself change from “active believer in good standing” to “seeker,” then “questioner”, then “agnostic,” to, most recently, “humanist” or “secularist.” (I am in the grieving stage now, experiencing the same sadness I felt when my father died 10 years ago, and therefore reluctant to take on the label of atheist just yet.)

I am mostly interested in how to deal with this in my marriage. I am “in the closet,” as a non-believer, for the most part. My wife knows I am having “problems with my testimony,” but as I go into detail, it turns into a corrective session on her part, with her bearing her testimony to me that she knows I am wrong, suggesting I talk to the Bishop, etc.

Having been in many leadership callings over the years, I have seen how sincerely so many LDS people expend their time and energy serving others in ways I could only classify as “Christian” (in the best possible sense of the word), so I doubt I will ever become as outspoken against the church as some of you. I am just realizing this doesn’t work for me.

For the last few years, I have turned down callings, I no longer speak up in discussions, etc. I travel a lot with my job and am relieved when travel prohibits my having to go to church and participate in this false state. I have been reading Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennet, in secret. Not easy, believe me. Secret zipper compartments in brief cases are wonderful. ha.

But I have 25 years of building this life with an LDS woman, and teaching our children in the ways of the church — how do I possibly rip the rug out from under them like this? The guilt I feel is horrendous right now. And I feel like I am going through so many things at once – the grief of loss, the guilt of bringing on this change to a good woman, and the inner turmoil of such a fundamental change, the letting go of a social network, etc. – and I can’t share it with my spouse, the one person we hope to be there when going through stuff like this.

I don’t know what to do. Despite having less and less in common, I still love my wife. We just can’t talk about a whole lot these days. That saddens me. But I’m a good father, and I have a great relationship with my children. I don’t know what I hope to accomplish by posting this. I guess it’s good to know you’re not alone?

Anyway, thanks again for the forum. I have no malice toward anyone in or outside the church. The scales have just fallen off my eyes, and I’m wondering what to do with this new vision. So far, the added light without the scales is painful, and I’m just standing here blinking and tearing up.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you check in from time to time.
I take it you don’t live in Utah (anymore?).

We haven’t really experienced the Church outside of Utah as a family, yet.
I get tempted to move from Utah, but I have to admit I’m torn sometimes. We really love the State, but it would be nice to move to a more diverse area for a change.

I haven’t heard anything about children being asked not to come up anymore. I’ll look into it, but I couldn’t imagine it being an official rule; maybe a wise bishop is on to this blog!!!

Cheers.

I did hear from my family in Utah recently that they are now officially asking members not to have their children come up anymore “because it looks like brainwashing.”

I too, have never been excommunicated. As an atheist, I wouldn’t really care, but my family would probably be embarassed, so I just avoid meetings and know they consider me “inactive.”

Thanks for a well written and accurate blog about this facet of the LDS church!

Indeed I agree with both of you.
I hope you noticed I stated that religion CLAIMS ownership on morality.

But if a person hasn’t learned right from wrong outside of dogma, they run the danger of disassociating the two and make bad choices.

Thanks for your comment and I hope you come back (and don’t worry about the misspellings!!!)

sorry for mispellings

That’s really a great question and a very important and equally complicated one.
I think every experience will differ tremendously depending on many factors: the length of the involvement with the Church; the Mormon to non-Mormon ratio in one’s personal life; the level of support from one’s family and friends; etc.
However, once you’re considered an apostate, you can pretty much say goodbye to any official communication with the Church.

I have talked to many apostates who have shared very unique experiences when leaving the Church.
They range from being completely shunned by their loved ones to not being able to voice their disbelief at all and are forced to live a life full of lies and fake appearance.
A good site for reading personal accounts of apostates is ExMormon.org. You can read plenty of exit stories there, but one thing you will find in common in most of those is the feeling of the weight off of one’s shoulder after they faced and came to terms with all the issues in the Church.

As far as my personal experience, I have not been excommunicated (yet), but I’ve tried to keep a pretty low profile, mostly out of respect to my wife’s involvement in the Church. I know how important it is to her and I think if I spoke out openly against the Church, she would feel the consequences as well (I do keep a certain level of anonymity on this site). I am completely inactive and have been for over two years now, but I’m still invited, from time to time, to different ward activities, especially those in which my wife is involved in organizing. Lately I was even invited to participate in a Stake (many wards) play, to which I politely declined (which tells me they were really desperate to find people).

One of the biggest dangers, however, and one I’ve personally witnessed, about leaving the Church, is due to religion’s claim on morality (a point I brought up on my post on LDS Scouts).
A person who leaves the Church may find themselves free from moral responsibilities and start leading their life in a negative way.
That’s not a danger solely owned by the LDS faith, but by most religions who preach absolute morality.

I appreciate the comment and hope you stop by again.