On Mon, Jun 10, 2013 at 7:21 PM, Daniel C. <[email protected]> wrote:
> I personally was extremely unhappy being Mormon. It never quite felt > right to me. There were little things that didn't quite add up. I > felt like I was living in The Truman Show, and if I just scratched at > the right spot the whole facade would come away. The default Mormon > answer to this kind of existential discomfort is to search, ponder and > pray, read the Book of Mormon, pray more, spend more time at the > temple... essentially, to try harder and harder to be Mormon. I can see how you might come to that conclusion, but it's pretty far off from how I see it. Those things inevitably lead me to consider the situation and ponder what is going to make myself happy and those around me happy. Other people might call this meditation, reasoning, etc. Buddhists meditate, atheists reason, Mormon's read the Book of Mormon. We are all trying to solve a problem as best we know how. > Because when you're Mormon, that's the answer to everything - after all, > the > fruits of righteousness are joy, right? If you're not happy you must > be doing it wrong. There is substantial evidence in the scriptures to suggest otherwise. In fact, God's "chosen" people were often persecuted. Life happens, people interfere, and so on. Keeping the commandments doesn't mean you'll always be happy. > Go see the Bishop, he'll set you on the right > path. Have you read the Book of Mormon recently? Maybe you just need > a different calling... wait, are you sure you've paid all of your > tithing? Discouragement, despair and depression are the three D's of > the devil - why are you letting the devil into your life? You must > not be praying enough. I bet it's 'cause you missed sacrament > meeting. Is your testimony okay? Have you been to the temple > recently? That always makes me feel better! > I'm sorry if that's the only advice you've gotten about your troubles. Much like you can make mistakes, the lay-leaders of the LDS church can make mistakes. Sometimes there aren't easy answers to difficult questions. It doesn't always just boil down to do X, Y, and Z and sometime the solution to my problems don't come until far after I would have liked to figure it out. > I'm glad that you're not > affected by the screwed up parts of your religion. > > I'm glad your not affected by the screwed up parts of your lack of religion! (See what I did there?) :) /* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
