This is an archived copy of a post written by Conflict Of Justice (conflictofjustice.com). Used with permission: Conflict Of Justice may not agree with any alterations made.
“I think the majority of hate directed at the church is only because it makes people uncomfortable to be that honest about their feelings of hatred for parents or other loved ones.” (Twitter)
What makes opponents of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints so angry? Is it simply bitterness for their parents? Many who leave move on and remain respectful, and that’s fine–I’m not talking about them–but others just can’t leave it alone, and the need to understand their exmormon delusion arises when their bitterness and hate affects our lives. It might be a family member, a coworker, a political group, or even an arsonist burning down your local church building. We should be doing something about it, and while we will not be able to heal the rift all the time despite our best efforts, we can at least pursue civility and peace through understanding.
Example #1 – From the Ex-Mormon Reddit hate site:
A grandfather is supposed to be the shining example of wisdom and unconditional love. But this grandfather hates his grandson implicitly for being “Mormon.” A three-year old’s innocent remark about tattoos triggers the grandfather to disassociate affection and familial warmth, because it is being so judgemental! He is trying to shame me! It is incredible to imagine a grandparent calling his three-year old grandson “stupid” and severing his relationship with him–blaming the three-year old, no less–but this is how deep the delusion runs.
Example #2 – To make a long story short, this exmormon recounts seeing a UFO as a child immediately after praying to Satan to reveal himself, and somehow this is evidence that the church isn’t true:
This Ex-Mormon Reddit member says he would have been in the murderous mob in the early days of the church.
In the early days of the church, when men who once considered Latter-day Saints their brothers and sisters apostatized, they didn’t just join the mob of murderers and rapists. They created and led the mobs. The delusion is all-engulfing and it can transform a saint into the worst kind of monster. Most haven’t taken it that far, but there is no doubt things are getting worse.
Maybe we can throw some water on the hostility if we get to the root of understanding it. How does their delusion start?
Absolute Perfectionism
The first complain I hear from BYU students beginning the apostasy process is that the church demands perfectionism. Those poor students are scarred for life because their parents wanted them to avoid porn, dress modestly, and avoid sex outside of marriage. They say it is cultish to make someone constantly feel unworthy, and that the church is too controlling. The obvious problem with this narrative is that it is a slippery slope: if the church dismissed “small” sins, then people demand more and more allowance, until church becomes nothing more than happy social hour where we all sing nice songs in a circle with a guitar. We would bleed membership like the Anglican church does, because most people understand that a church should require discipline and instruct the sacrifice necessary to make a person godly. The foundation of Christianity is divine justice, and in order for God to be God He needs to be perfect. And in order to be exalted by God and inherit His kingdom we therefore must be perfect. The Book of Mormon explains at length why “no unclean thing” can be in the kingdom of God. It is the nature of justice, and this is where our system of morality begins. We like to talk about mercy, but we must first understand why the need for eventual perfection.Ex-Mormon doxxes a member of the Seventy. Twitter refuses to take it down.
This makes many kids feel inadequate, because no matter how hard you try there is always going to be something horrible about you. If somehow you have managed to purge all unclean acts from your behavior, what about your thoughts? Jesus said he who has desire to lust after a woman has sinned in his hear alright, right? If you manage to purge all unclean thoughts, what about what happens in your dreams at night? Are your dreams all clean? Desires? What about innocent mistakes? I have determined that you cannot control the thoughts that enter your head but you can control what you do with them, and that’s what matters. This is something that is not always articulated clearly and it led me to feel inadequate as a kid. “Lust” is not having a thought show up; it is entertaining a thought, feeding and perpetuating it so that eventually it leads to action. Everybody has crazy thoughts show up.
As for dreams, I think the purpose of dreams is to explore thoughts subconsciously that the consciousness is not willing to consider. It’s not a bad thing to have give consideration to all thoughts that are taboo, unconventional, and frequently dismissed. Many people dismiss our gospel as a “bad thought,” after all. How many converts would be open to the gospel if they suppressed every thought that conflicted with their accepted beliefs? I recall singing in a missionary choir on the streets of Germany, and it was usually children who would stop to listen, and their parents would yank them away irritated. Kids have not yet been fully conditioned on what to automatically reject or consider. The problem with fencing your belief system completely off is that there are plenty of good ideas that get locked out. We need to carefully consider how we judge which thoughts we entertain or purge on first sight.
Many Exmormons I talk to say as a member they treated the commandments like a checklist of what’s allowed and not allowed, or like a template of perfection and everything that didn’t measure up was instantly rejected. I do not think this is a healthy approach, and I do not think sin is all black and white in severity. There are different levels of consequences. Just as jaywalking is a less serious crime than robbing a bank, we have got to consider that some sins are more serious than others and that it is impossible to avoid all transgressions. Nobody in your ward at church is pure as the driven snow right now, and so, the gatehouse in our mind needs to practice some discretion. You don’t need to beat yourself up over every little thing. The point is to gain self-control and eventual mastery over your identity, not to yield control to the church or your parents or anyone else.
I’m not saying be permissive of sin. But keep a perspective of the level of consequences for sins and have a plan for how to deal with your human nature. I think the Exmormon delusion starts with this demand for immediate perfection without any plan or recognition for their human nature. So they flip out at the slightest mistake. If they mess up and drink coffee they feel as if they have just gotten drunk at a bar. This is what I call the “contradiction strategy,” where you develop a rigid ideology and purge anything that contradicts this ideology as equally repugnant to your ends. I have noticed Antimormon literature adopts this mindset and follows this contradiction strategy. It is a strategy adopted by Marxism, and I do not think it is a Christlike or healthy way to go.
When I was interviewing to go on my mission, I remember my Stake President grilling me. Priesthood leader interviews are another sore spot for Exmormons, because they say they felt put under a microscope and they felt bad enough about themselves. How dare they ask invasive questions? I could tell my Stake President could tell that I felt inadequate, and he wanted to make sure it wasn’t because of some transgression. Usually that’s what it is, so I can’t fault him for that, but the truth is I hadn’t done anything to hold myself back. I just lacked confidence because I knew the difficult task ahead and I’m not a social person. I’m not persuasive. I knew little about the gospel, and my testimony was still beginning. Later in the MTC, I had the chance to shake the hand of Elder Richard G. Scott. There was a long line waiting behind me and he had already taken so much of his time, so I tried to be brief. “Thank you,” I said before moving on. But he held on to my hand with both arms, looked me straight in the eyes and slowly said, “Thank you Elder for being here.” I had always considered Elder Scott’s mannerisms in General Conference theatrical, but there was no denying his sincerity as he spoke with that same emotion. It burned into my soul, and now every time I hear his talks the absolute sincerity of his voice is unmistakable. It meant that I was good enough, and that God was grateful for me personally making an effort, and I needed to know this in order to improve.
Repentance requires confidence, to have vision of what you will be and belief you will change. Meekness is not weak confidence. The Exmormon delusion starts when you think there is something wrong with you because you falter, when really you just need to take a leap into the unknown and do your best because you know your best is good enough. The delusion is that you think you don’t stand up to the beaming faces of all those other missionaries and you don’t have power. Lack of confidence makes a person beat themselves up, and eventually blame someone else in order to find the courage to keep on going. Thus, the delusion spreads as a person projects their insecurities and assigns responsibility where it doesn’t belong. Often, they find cajoling therapists to assure them they are the victims of this, this, and this. But time ticks on and they don’t get any better, and their resentment swells as they hate themselves over nothing and blame family or church for things we didn’t do. It’s because they follow the popular culture’s method of purging on first glance all hint of contradiction to this template of perfection in their minds.
Redemption Vs. Universal Salvation
It comes down to this. You can either:
- Mortify your flesh and whip your back over every little sin.
- Humbly admit your human nature and confidently seek redemption through Christ’s atonement.
- Allow sin to happen and adjust your moral framework to some other standard.
- Mortify your flesh and whip your back over every little sin.
- Humbly admit your human nature and confidently seek redemption through Christ’s atonement.
- Allow sin to happen and adjust your moral framework to some other standard.