Bethany J

This is exactly what I've been feeling. I don't believe I know anyone in these wards. But the building looks like the churches I know. And the people look like the people I know. And it hurts, regardless of the fact that this isn't my community anymore. It is all so senselessly tragic.

Happy Birthday!!

Is there good? Sure, but that's a different question. Is it good? Not good enough.

And if I'm wrong and the church is right, I'll stand before the proverbial judgment bar and say as much. If I was meant to stay a part of "God's true church," then it should have done more good.

In that reevaluation, and deconstruction, I concluded that it wasn't good. Or at least, not good enough. On the scales of doing harm and doing good, enabling predators to get away with abusing children cannot be outweighed by any amount of good. Neither can ostracizing LGBTQ+ individuals.

So I clung to that, and to Jesus. So to answer the question, "Is it true?" I would have said, true enough. I can deal with mythology and allegory and metaphor.

I never asked myself, "Is it good." When confronted with the reality that the church does things that actively harm people, I reevaluated.

"The fundamental principles of our religion are the testimony of the Apostles and Prophets, concerning Jesus Christ, that He died, was buried, and rose again the third day, and ascended into heaven; and all other things which pertain to our religion are only appendages to it."

Agreed. I remember thinking, "none of this (religion/faith) makes any sense, but I believe it," back in 2012. I stopped attending in 2023. In that decade, I came to realize more and more things that weren't true. And I accepted that. I reduced everything down to a single Joseph Smith quote:

Government is about the organization of society, and society is just all of us. It's a way of harnessing all of the sustaining and exponentially generative value that we humans create just by living in proximity to one another.

My brother sent me this link today - Trump to visit Museum of the Bible.

I have never been more grateful to have walked away from this place.

MOTB was a wild ride and while I learned a lot and appreciate the experience, I am relieved that it's all in my past.

thehill.com/homenews/adm...

Nothing prepared me for how often I use Excel in an office environment.

Everything is Excel.

Even when it makes no sense and we have other tools that will make everything easier. Excel. Always.

I have had nothing but positive interactions 😄

Agreed. I avoid the word as well but if the shoe fits...

It just feels so fake. Like you don't know these people, they aren't your friends. In Russia the word we used translated to listener and while it doesn't work as well in English, there's gotta be a happy medium between investigator and friend

I'm so sorry. Good for you for doing what you could to honor your friend while maintaining boundaries. I'm sorry people shunned you.

Friend feels so weird. My parents have had the missionaries over for dinner on occasion and whenever they say friend I have to translate it to investigator in my head. Especially because they still use it like weirdos. "We've got 6 friends in our teaching pool." "We had 3 friends at church." Ick

I think this nails the distinction. I know several people who have gone inactive with possible plans to go back at some point - they left to sin (quite literally their words). As opposed to most self-identified exmos I know who left because the church broke their hearts and they won't be going back.

I'm sure Paul was definitely thinking about quantum physics when he wrote his letter to the Corinthians

The firefighter, whose name has not been made public, has lived in the US for 19 years after arriving with his family at the age of four. He received a U-visa certification from the US attorney's office in Oregon in 2017 and submitted his U-visa application with US Citizenship and Immigration Services the following year. The U-visa program was established by Congress to protect victims of serious crimes who assist federal investigators, and the man has been waiting since 2018 for the immigration agency to decide on his application, according to Stephen Manning, a lawyer with Innovation Law Lab, a Portland-based nonprofit representing the firefighter. Another homeland security policy says agents cannot detain people who are receiving or have applied for victim-based immigration benefits, his lawyer said. Charging the man with an immigration violation was "an illegal after-the-fact justification" given his U-visa status.

I really hope this becomes the black eye it deserves to be www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

I haven't been on a Mormon tour of Maya ruins, but I've experienced a similar phenomenon with the Pearl of Great Price while in Egypt. Mormon apologetics are wild.

I took a class from Daniel Peterson. I liked it, but there's no world in which I'd pay thousands of dollars to be on a cruise with him.

It's very strange. I'm close to someone who is pretty involved in that kind of thing and it's eye opening. I was at BYU during education week one year (I didn't attend, but was on campus for something related) and the way people treat professors or speakers like celebrities is weird.

Also, Jasmin is lovely. I haven't spoken to her in a few years, but I would hang out with her for a week. Just not while trapped on a boat with a bunch of other mormon Podcasters.

I'm here!

I led a mormon adjacent tour of Egypt last year (I was no longer active, but mostly kept that to myself). It's a weird industry for sure. I still need to pull together an exmo Egypt tour. Not nearly as lucrative, but I bet it would be way more fun 😂

You got this! Everything is gonna be fine. Hopefully I'll get to give you a big hug soon ❤

I'm glad for those that can find a way to live life on their terms and stay in, but it's definitely frustrating to witness. Especially since it seems like the church doesn't really care as long as they pay tithing and aren't "causing trouble"

Sometimes conversations about Mormons behaving badly comes up in my friend group (non members). One friend has pointed out how much that bothers me, and every time I say something like "you have no idea how hard I tried to do the right thing, and how guilty I felt for never doing enough."

Turns out I should have just lied and ignored that overwhelming sense of guilt. Could have avoided a lot of heartache. Who knew that was the secret?

(My morals won't allow for that, but I guess others aren't as bothered)

Schitt's Creek
Boy Meets World (the nostalgia helps haha)
Sabrina the Teenage Witch (again, nostalgia)
The Good Place
Ted Lasso
Brooklyn 99
The Mindy Project
Great British Bake Off
Pushing Daisies (except it got cancelled too soon!)

Usually when people say "Jesus said," it's nonsense, but he definitely had things to say about people who harm children, and his followers should maybe consider listening. If your organization is on the side of protecting the abuser - you're the bad guy

I will never understand why reporting sexual assault/abuse of children is up for debate.

I love board games! I'm not sure it was a good thing I saw this post (at least not for my wallet), but I sent some money their way. I'm sorry for you friend's family.