not apparently to sacrament meeting, some days.
i lead the hymns in church, as you all know. and despite how often i laugh-cry about it, i really do think it's the best thing i could ask for. i love the music and i love feeling it wash over me from the congregation below.
this blog isn't the right place to be writing what i'm about to write. you who read these posts represent all that i love and admire about my mormon heritage and tradition. please, don't keep reading if you will be hurt by a bit of disgruntled scrutiny of mormon culture, even if it comes from an insider. instead, tune in to my next post, in which i'll talk at length about all that i truly love about it.
this morning i sat directly behind two gentlemen from the high council, whose job it was to preach to our congregation. as i sat there watching my two small fries in one of the pews below, wiggling in the arms of the couple who were supervising them them for me {hubs being still in texas}, i couldn't help but overhear what the high councilors were saying regarding our current president and {worse!} the people who seem to like him so much and would even be foolish enough to vote for him.
one of the gentlemen explained that {as he likes to tell people at work} past republican presidents have built administrations comprised of "people who know how to run a business," whereas obama's cabinet is only 8% such, the rest being "a bunch of academics."
to which my intellectual-fearing heart chimed back, hear, hear! how long do we have to suffer these smart people to piddle around before affairs are rightfully turned back to the ones who are so good with dollars?! it's simple commerce! it's what we value in this country, after all: getting that money. and keeping things the way {we think, or we've heard} they've always been--or is it the way they used to be? oh, but wait...
i imagine these leaders may have chosen their words more carefully had they known that the person sitting behind them was interested in the conversation. but in their defense, i was quite invisible, being only the lady chorister. in a moment of passion i leaned in between the two to announce myself as one of "those people who voted for [obama]," but just then the meeting started and i lost my chance, and my nerve.
there's this little voice in me saying, don't speak now while you're upset. wait until it passes. think it through and don't make a mistake.
i might stop listening to that voice, because although i may have made the wiser choice by not confronting them there and then, I feel cheated out of the opportunity to see what, if any, impact my revelation would have had on their prepared sermons: Church Public Relations, and How We Should Train Our Minds Totally on Thoughts of the Savior During Sacrament Meeting. IRONY, anyone?
in the past i would have quieted myself with the thoughts that i should listen closely to these men {men, men, men, men, men, men....} whom i am supposed to follow {follow, follow, follow, follow, follow, ....} because if i really made an effort, in good faith, i could find something to learn.
i learned something anyway. anger does pass. but you know what doesn't? apathy. because why? because apathy is that vacuum left inside you after that anger passes if you can't find any love to fill it back up with. i don't want to go there.
that's why this post is alternately titled, FOR THE LOVE!
i have this recurring daydream. in it are myself and everyone i love most in the world. we build a great big, beautiful house together, where we're all going to live happily ever after. but just as we're finishing the last coat of paint and settling in, people start to leave. one by one they walk out of the house until it becomes clear that i am going to be the only one left and that, no matter what happens, i can't leave. even as i think of ways to make everything okay, i watch helplessly as chunks of plaster fall out of the building and the house shakes on its foundation. it turns out that everyone has come back, but this time they're here to tear down the house and still, there is nowhere for me to go.
it's a new version of an old nightmare i had as a kid: that i am alone in a burning house, backed into a corner, and i understand that the world is ending.
tell me, you of earlier generations: has it always felt this way? there is a man on the radio who says that BP's monumental disaster doesn't yet rank with the top oil spills in the world in terms of impact on the environment. if we can divert most of it from reaching the coastline, it's just another drop in the ocean. so why does it feel like something vital is leaking out of me as every day passes without a solution? and has there always been this polarization of politics that inspires angry posts like this one {ME VS. THEM}, or can i hope for some reconciliation? i am, very simply, afraid. i can't imagine my daughters 10 years from now without imagining what terror might happen between now and then--what our world will look like. what my church will look like. already it's becoming harder for me to recognize.
and the people with whom i long to identify, the people who are my very own, well, we seem to have put some distance between ourselves and the downtrodden.
poor me! IRONY!
it's not the opposing opinions that are necessarily offensive to me; it's the assumption that, when spoken in the place where we worship, these opinions are shared by everyone within hearing distance. why else would anyone feel free to speak with such contempt and disrespect? i reserve the right to be offended, and if that's my pride speaking, let it speak clearly. what did i learn? that i should have spoken up in the moment. if i'm too afraid, then maybe i need more practice.
which brings me to the point of all of this:
if i am going to live in this place {and i do intend to} despite the fact that it can be very painful and very lonesome sometimes, i am going to have to do some redecorating, save the living artifacts of my faith and move them to the forefront. i am going to have to write out my manifesto and pin it on the door. consider this a preamble.
30 of you said:
Exactly.
I've begun thinking that what really makes me worry about raising my children in the LDS church is not so much the patriarchy (though that is really problematic) and it's not so much the often rank social conservatism (though it's pretty awful too) and it's not even so much the requirement to shut up and do what your mind and heart tells you is wrong wrong wrong (though that's nearly the worst).
It's the us vs them mentality that underpins all of the above along with every other aspect of today's LDS church. The idea that there is absolute good and absolute evil; that there God and there is the Devil; that there are The Saints and The World.
I'm coming to think that this inside-outside way of viewing the world is the most dangerous, damaging and damning thing about living as a Mormon in the US these days.
Our Daisy Spots is getting to the point where I don't have a lot of answers I can feel good about giving re: why we still belong to the church. I think for us the house is coming down.
PS--Thanks for posting this. I hope you won't take it down.
i had the same thought. please don't take it down...
This sounds precisely like many of the conversations that occur in our home on a weekly basis. We come home and we piss and moan about the ridiculous nature of things we hear at church.
And then I have to remind myself that the people in the church often make it hard to hear/learn the gospel. I wish this was not the case, but it so often is.
Oh, and three cheers for Democrats!
First of all, please don't take it down. It is so thoughtfully written and so honest.
I'm afraid, too, and not because of oil spills and earthquakes, political rhetoric and vitriolic disagreements (though I find those draining emotionally and psychologically and, frankly, I'm just plain sick of them.) My fear comes more from the assumption many of those church-high-ouncilor-types make that within the church everyone must (and does--or should--)think the same way. I don't like how that divides us and separates us internally, and makes some of our numbers want to take their leave of us. And I don't like how it separates us, as they are fond of saying, from the "rest of the world." I think the assumption is just wrong and that people who make it are, too. It's sort of some church members' version of an "in" mentality of thinking, it's what the "in crowd" is doing, not much different than the "cool" high school kids who are "in" because they wear the "right" jeans or shoes to school. HOW silly!! How SILLY! I've sat in ward correlation meetings that felt sickeningly just like that "in crowd," given the comments that people made, and I've sat in some that are, as I imagine, the way Christ himself would run them. Fortunately, the latter happens to be prevalent in our ward at present. Our current and and our last bishop would totally get you, Krista.
My hope is that the articulate and thoughtful people like you will calmly make your voices heard, respectfully and with self-assurance, but that you won't just pack up your marbles and quit playing. This church needs your level heads.
I don't want it to crash and burn because it's always been my code of conduct, my push to be better than I'm capable of being on my own. When I was your age, I didn't see its flaws (or should I say the flaws of its leaders?), so I felt safe in the striving. Nowadays, though, there are some very glaring flaws that threaten to shatter us if everyone entrenches and refuses to listen to what we can learn from just listening. So I think the striving needs to take on a different face, and I think you've got it. It's an improvement on the old striving. It's a grander picture. It's the striving we need to do today because nothing's the same for you kids now as it was when I was growing up. And it'll take all the self-assurance and confidence you can muster, because someone, somewhere will surely try to sideline you.
And even if there were no Mormon church, it still needs to happen.
thank you, thank you, thank you. all of you have said just the right things and you will help me sleep more peacefully tonight.
as much as i hate to confront what i don't like {because then i have to acknowledge it exists}, i feel more able to do it as i understand what i truly love enough to protect. so i won't take it down, even though i am sure i'll really want to tomorrow.
i love this faith. i don't imagine it's ever going to be as easy for me as it once was, and along with that faith is a good measure of despair. but as long as i feel enough to struggle {or strive, as nicea says}, i am grateful to still be feeling.
although as jessica says, it is often people that antagonize us, it is also precisely the people that embody the gospel, so i find it difficult to separate the one from the other. therein is my joy . . . and my madness.
After I left my comment I realized what you just said in yours: it is the people that help me live the gospel. It's the "crazies" that help me to look inside myself to find the good in them. It's those that I don't agree with that force me to show love that I may not want to show.
I love this post. Thanks for making my brain work on this day of rest.
Ready for an epistle? I think maybe I'm one of those people you worried about being offended by hearing a little bit of disgruntled scrutiny of mormon culture. But I'm not. I would have been right behind you had you said something to those men. Idiots. (Shawn, they're not idiots, they just did a stupid thing.) It took me a lot of years to be able to say to myself, "Now wait a minute," when I heard something that didn't ring true from the pulpit or in casual conversation. It took me some more years before I had the guts to approach a "mucky muck" (a more common term would be "leader")and speak my mind. I was very emotional when I did it but I've never regretted it. I did it in a nice way but I felt something needed to be said and I even felt like I might have taught that person a thing or two. (How's that for pride?) I have felt irritated by comments many other times too and haven't said anything except to discuss it very angrily with a friend or two. You know, the whole gossip behind the back thing. All that does is make me feel guilty, which is good since we all need a little more guilt in our lives, right? Sometimes I say something, sometimes I don't. Sometimes I remember that I KNOW I have said/done some pretty ignorant and/or hypocritical things in the past as well. I try not to dwell on them too much because then I get down on myself and I do that too much as it is.
Where can you turn for peace? How about to the gospel of Jesus Christ, not to be confused with the teachings/opinions of the people of the church of Jesus Christ? Don't get me wrong. There are some amazing sermons spoken from the pulpit when you can just feel that the person speaking strives hard to practice what they preach. Then there are the others. We have to sift.
Sometimes I have doubts, and then I try to head back to the basics. Faith. HOPE. Charity. Jesus. The Atonement. Heavenly Father. And then I try to chalk it up to ignorance or whatever when I witness something like you did. And once in a great while, we have a really fantastic testimony meeting like we did last Sunday featuring mostly adult converts who don't have the 'mormon culture' background and then I feel the peace.
I think sometimes that you and yours (whom I also think of as mine) might think that I fall into the "rank social conservatism" group Richard mentioned. And I guess I do in some ways. But I know that I have come a long way from where I've been and I also know that, at least in my ward, even though there is the US vs. THEM mentality from some people, there are some amazing people who really "get it" and have taught me so much. (And people can be conservative in some ways and still "get it", right?) I don't think I'm completely there yet but I'm gaining ground in the right direction--at least I think I am. You and yours have helped, as have a couple of my kids. But mostly just living here among so many different kinds of members of the church and learning to think things through on my own and being able to discuss things openly with people I trust, has helped.
In a nutshell, (well we are long past that now, aren't we?) charity slashes through the "absolute good and absolute evil; God and the Devil; and The Saints and The World" idea.
Truer words than these were never spoken: without charity, we are nothing. If everyone practiced this in all ways all the time, it would be a lot easier to be a believer all the time.
But that ain't gonna happen in this life.
I think I'm done now.
i'll echo: please oh please don't take it down.
it's 1:17am which means i shouldn't be typing right now because sentences don't come out as sense at this time of night. at least not from my fingers. but i'll say amen to all of you commenters above and hope that maybe we who feel this way can find a way to stay and help each other. cause it will sure be lonely without the rest of you and i don't really wanna leave, even though sometimes i think i do. although, as you so thoughtfully said, those are the times i have to dig deep and really live the gospel. but it's harder now, because my faith has changed since those days when i could simply accept without questioning. and there's that dose of despair, too.
all that to say, i'm glad you're here. you give me strength.
Ok, I wasn't really done. I didn't see Nicea's comment or your follow up until after I posted mine. So one more thing...
ditto
@jessica: i think you said that so nicely. to be very honest, i'm not sure how well i am really doing with loving the people, and i sometimes question my own understanding of the word. that's certainly still the goal. for now i'm working on respect: one human to another.
@shawn: i was hoping for an epistle! i knew you all would come through for me when i needed you. and i will feel you standing behind me next time i need to say something that feels important. that's some very wise counsel you've given me and i won't forget it.
it's been another day of hard-won gratitude but i must say that i am very thankful.
@annie: annie. you are one of those people i think about when i need to feel good about something. if you'll "beer me strength" then i will beer you some right back.
i hope you are an Office fan, or that last bit is going to make no sense to you.
I love you!
@SC: jokes like that are why you can't feel the spirit when your inspired leaders (redundant!) speak.
Thank you for busting this topic wide open for discussion. :)
I've spoken about it a little with RD, Dad, Lola, but always in little snippets and never with a clear idea of "where do I/we go from here (if anywhere)?" Now, I wonder if we can't find some way that we can all talk about it on a regular basis.*
I've always felt an intense closeness to my family even though I am the worst among them at expressing it. You have always made it safe to go venturing out beyond my comfort zone, because I always know you are there if things go bad.
This post and the attending comments (by all, not just my sibs) reinvigorated a feeling that we must be connected in some sublime and spiritual way. I've lived so far away from all of you (geographically speaking) for so long, and am so bad at calling and keeping in touch, that to see you all struggling with the same issues Meg and I are wrestling with, at the same time, is very humbling and reassuring.
*I started "taking notes" on the topic on a personal blog. Maybe that's a start.
@RD: I know this kinda sounds corny. But I was thinking on the bus ride to work today about how to answer the sorts of questions you say Daisy Spots is asking.
As a child I always felt like my parents new everything about everything (shut up, I wasn't as smart as you). Subconsciously, I think believing that gave me the confidence that they would set me straight if I strayed too far.
But now that I'm older, with my own children, I know that was a fantasy. So I wonder if my discussions with E&P won't be more along the lines of "no one can tell you the way, not me and not mom. But those who love you will walk with you, and going somewhere unknown is always less scary when you know you're not alone."
@Shawn: Your profile picture with Lil'M (his rapper name) is super darling.
What incredible people you all are! SC - your house is solid and strong. I admire your honesty and forthrightness written in such a kind way - despite your initial feelings of anger - and I applaud your recognition of the importance - to one's self, if no other - of "speaking up" when you feel injustice or intolerance knocking at the door of the place where you live.
@BHal & RD: thanks for being here, and for what you've said. you are the brothers for me. the exact right brothers. my brethren, shall i say? as long as i have you, i'm feeling pretty set on brethren.
Right back atcha, Sis.
Also, dude, "bretheren" is not the preferred nomenclature. "Brethern," please.
@B-Hal: I like how you think, sir. We've done our best to keep things non-exclusive. Had lots of conversations about how DS doesn't have to believe or think anything that doesn't feel right to her, even if people at church tell her she should believe it. And I mean, lots.
The only trouble with telling her that she can find her own way is that her mom and I are still telling her she has to come to church. So until she's old enough to stay home on her own, she isn't really, meaningfully allowed to find her own way.
That's the sticky wicket for us at this point. She can't really choose to stay home, but I have fewer and fewer compelling reasons to force her to come along.
Walter has all the compelling reason you need.
"Shomer F#@$IN SHABBOS!"
@All my children and their lovelies'
Especially Krista who is troubled and who has the gift that the rest of us do not. We have our own...to each is given.
Just wanted to say something, because, well, it's bike riding time and the roads are narrow around here...write while you can.
Yes, the bad was always this bad....probably worse. I have tried to leak some of that to you all during my sojourn in the heartland. The difference I see between then and now is the sharing of ideas, good and bad, via TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol).
Yours is the generation that is dealing with this flood of information without the tools (emotional and technological) to deal with it without some minor meltdowns. At the same time, the house really is burning. The faith systems of generations are falling short and being exposed. Kind of sucky in some ways, really amazing and great in others. A rennaissance! for you and your babies. I wish you could see the stuff we are putting together to light up healthcare delivery via the vision of people like Mr. O ba ma. We need the business types and we know we do, but they don't understand how much they need the visionaries. Old story..they can follow the Ezra Taft Beentheres of the of the imaginary "free market".
So, go to church....don't go to church...whatever church. It doesn't matter. What does matter is that you defend each other, my Littles. Regardless of how much the institution wants you to put it first...DO NOT! Defending each other IS loving each other, regardless. I have had only 2 people in my life (other than the 4 of you) who have done that for me. They have passed on to who knows where, but they are with me always here. Make sure that yours have that. The institution will leave them faster than Joseph Smith left his enemies (aka creditors) in nearby Kirtland.
Like I have said so many times about the 60s Big Bang and it's influence on our present world. The religion got it's foothold in the evolution of marketing during that decade. It has all the money and slick marketing execs that it will ever want on it's path to nowhere. You need to defend and love yours first and you will ALWAYS have peace.
As far as the goofballs sitting in front of you in church. Remember to take a big thick rubber band with you to church. Say nothing, just wang them a good one...choose the one with the biggest ears or the baldest head.
I love you guys. Keep sticking up for each other.
Grady
What a great post. What great comments.
I have always been a sucker for honesty.
In the tiny Canadian branch I was raised in, my sister recalls a primary lesson about obeying the Sabbath. The older woman giving the lesson recalled: "I told my husband, I said 'Paul, you better not work in the fields today because it's Sunday' but he wouldn't listen to me and said he was going to work in the fields anyways. So I went out in the yard and I broke his machine. WELL! He was SO mad he took off after me and chased me around the farm yard with an axe."
One of my young women's leaders kept snakes as pets used them as a young women's activity. Ya, just going and looking at them. and most of the time she cancelled our activities because she wasn't feeling well.
She also read out her entire patriachal blessing for one of our lessons.
Why do I share this? I don't know. I guess I never grew up thinking my leaders were infallible. Or more rightly, from very early on I was introduced to the idea that our leaders are all very, very human.
totally and completely in agreement. I would proliferate my agreement, but you've said it perfectly. However, in my own home where I am very outnumbered I must say it is more comforting to stay quiet an only bring up little snippets when I call the conservative radio hosts on their errors. And I'm only a moderate.
SC: great post. I go with the 'cool down first' method of approaching people and then often don't get to the actual "approaching". And I wish I would.
I go back and forth between wild frustration and denial. Working in the nursery now, it's easier to think everything is fine. So long as I get to church late enough to miss the Sac.Mtg talks.
I, too, am trying to pick out the wheat from the chaff, still figuring out what rings true, who to believe. I have to remember not to dismiss all church-going-members as hateful people, when I know and love so many. sigh.
I guess I don't have much to add after all but wanted to add my voice in support of your post. I get it. I love you and I hope you keep on.
I'm still thinking about this, and I guess I always will be. Some more thoughts: I'm not so afraid that the church will cease to exist as we know it, because I believe it's here for us as a sort of tool to lean on. As we grow in spirituality and knowledge, I think the church (any church) is less and less necessary. If we believe that Christ will reign one day, then there will be no churches or isms. I see what's happening nowadays, now that information is more available to us than it was when I was young, as a step in the direction of there being no organized churches. I have full confidence in what I believe in in my faith and in how that has helped me. I also have full confidence in what I believe doesn't make sense and in disagreeing with some of the practices I hear preached from the pulpit and in Sunday School. You kids seem to be coming to that place at a younger age than I did, and I'm not sure I'd have gotten there at your age even with the availability and accessibility of the information at your fingertips today. (Some people of my generation did get there. I just wasn't one of them.) I've had to go through my own process and I've made some mistakes.
I heard an interview with a woman rabbi this morning on NPR's "Speaking on Faith." She was talking about spirituality as a dimension of our humanness, a dimension that unites more than divides us (religions tend to divide), and about the many names for God. She said spiritually we all want our children to be gracious, courageous during life's difficult times, compassionate and understanding, among others. Most of us would agree on those spiritual qualities. She also defined prayer to someone who didn't know how to pray (speaking your fears, your hopes, etc.).
Here's my main walkaway and I agree with it entirely: Most of us with religion in our lives were born into it. It's not wrong to question. In fact, spirituality is a quest, a lot of questions. We should not let people who have not found our particular religious tradition to be helpful to them define how it is or is not helpful to us. "Give it a chance," she said. Nor should we let those people inside the faith whose practice of the faith for some reason doesn't feel right or good to us define it either. Further, we are not just descendants in our faith, we are also ancestors and it is our privilege and our right to help shape what its future looks like.
I love that last part.
@ALL OF YOU: your comments are what i am going to come back to again and again for the comfort and courage i need to stay standing. when i need more faith, i will have faith in you. i honestly did. not. believe. it was possible to feel so good after feeling so bad.
thank you for seeing that this post was about more than taking offense at an isolated event. you really got it, and i feel like i'm completely supported by the people i admire most. also, thank you for making me laugh, since i was getting a little too "serial." so, so nice to hear from you, merebuff, char, miss kitti, jessica, sarah, and of course my own good family.
as for you, Grady. i am pretty sure the interned was invented solely so that you could write, and i could read, that comment from you.
*Internet
I prefer interned. The global Nedwork of Neds.
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