Distortions are harmful

Why is it so hard to feel like life is not as black and white? Growing-up is hard in your late 30's. I don't think it is healthy to see life as black and white/right or wrong/good and bad/ etc as I was taught. These are called cognitive distortions. In the world of therapy, these are considered harmful.

Why are we teaching children to believe distortions are absolute truth? Probably because the teachers are the perpetrators of distortions. If you don't, you get released from your calling as a teacher as I have been. Not that I taught one thing against the church. I just didn't teach so black and white. No complaints from kids or parents but only a bishop who feels my beliefs are not accurate. From my therapist,. I was always taught to not speak using distortions and be accurate when I did. It is definitely more complex than I thought.

Garment's Lies and Videotapes blog post at blog Rational Faiths reply:

What you say makes sense...unfortunately it is also what makes it so hard. i went to original sources with my questions and the truth was hard. I thought posts like yours would have been to deceive the very elect at one point in my life. Now it is all just muddy water and posts like this feel less deceptive than the topic essays as you mention. Just more rabbit holes for members who finally question to discover.

How to navigate these waters is hard for me. I see shame from family at even thinking or saying that the church could have practiced deception. This last week I have seen what expressing my beliefs have resulted in with my calling release and no temple recommend (not from any sin as per questions but from historicity and prophet beliefs). I can't go back to my nice correlated box when the wold is so much more beautiful than I ever imagined (not talking about slothfulness but the beauty of all people, races, religions, cultures, etc.)

My comfort recently is in blogs that see things not so black/white helps, my husband who has also began questioning, and....guess that is it right now. Oh, I also take comfort in my inner peace....wow, not something I found at church as I did search for 20 years there. So I have been going to church but now I have no calling and neither does my husband (he said if you are releasing my wife, release me to....he says he is just questioning, which is ok to do and keep calling but he finds himself falling out of the box too).

Not sure how to stay and not sure how to leave....kind of a limbo state. 5 Kids and extended family make it more challenging. Just me I would....good question...not sure...






Wow, Sue.

Thanks for sharing your experience.

It can be very hard having questions and then being honest enough with ourselves to finally stop suppressing them, and then be honest enough with others to tell them how we feel.

A Church that puts such a high value on “truth” should not penalize its members for seeking after it, nor for expressing it.

Unfortunately, it seems the LDS Church has a definition of “truth” that means whatever the correlated Mormon doctrine of the moment may happen to be.

In some weird Orwellian way, the Church has managed to equate “truth” with “obedience.”

And “obedience” means not only what you do, but what you believe.

In fact, I think a case can be made for the proposition that the most important thing in the modern LDS Church is not so much what you do but what you believe.

Thoughtcrime is the cardinal sin.

That is what you are being punished for, I think.

And good for your husband for standing up for you that way! It sounds like his way of saying that you are more important to him than the Church.

Which is another of the cardinal sins.

Nothing should be more important to the member than the Church. Not money, not time, not sacrifice, not family, not spouse.

The members exist for the Church, not the Church for the members.

Which is why I think the apocryphal Thomas Marsh milk-strippings story gets so much play.

Just know you are not alone. There are many in the Church who share your sentiments.

And maybe, just maybe, as our numbers approach critical mass, we can make a change for the good.

And for truth.

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I did bring up to the bishop that what Joseph Smith was famous for was questions and seeking answers. Yes, I was a by the book girl. FEAR – false evidence appearing real was my guiding light. I have history of seeeing answers to birth control, caffeine soda drinks (bad I was taught), and then decided if it came out of salt lake it was important cause they knew stuff I couldn’t find and would follow their words and never look else where for help. That is when the depression peaked and I started therapy as a last ditch effort. Even my lds therapist can see the damage. We need more competent training for our leaders. This is crazy how we are discouraged from growing-up in the church. The depth of our doctrine is very childlike and mostly taught in obedience or else thinking. Tough to have your best friends in the church see you as an apostate in many ways. I just see greater love and hope and faith in a loving God, who I am not sure looks like, but feel in my heart and gives me peace.

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You are right that in the LDS Church, we never really graduate from Primary.

Growing up should be encouraged.

More and more the Church is being confronted with “adolescents” who are tired of being treated like children.

Adolescents who are questioning and challenging.

It is all part of growing up.

It is a good thing.

It should be encouraged.

But the Church’s response seems to be to tell the ones who want to grow up that they need to remain as a child.

Wholly dependent on the Church, by which they tend to mean priesthood leaders.

“I Am a Child of God” takes on an eerie cast when considered in this light.

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Thanks for the validation. Needed it!!!
“Teach me all that I must BE.” original version. God is all about the Kingdom of God within us as taught by Jesus. That is my God that encourages inner growth and not outward performances. Thanks again!

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