How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

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_Amore
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How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _Amore »

My faith crisis has hurt most of my relationships, but a few, it's actually helped.
What about you?
_AmyJo
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Re: How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _AmyJo »

Leaving Mormonism I don't see as a crisis of my faith. My faith improved and is better for my having left it behind.

As a Mormon my relationships suffered. I grew up one, so imagine the cultural conditioning received investing the years into it like were done for me, had a negative impact on the quality of my life - living with the cognitive dissonance inside of a cult will do to your psyche, while distancing myself from the world.

How we were taught to be 'in the world but not of the world,' is so ingrained into who I've become. Leaving Mormonism only resolved the pseudo faith dilemma of living a lie.

It didn't erase all the years of cultural conditioning learned at our parents knees.

You have to start somewhere though to break that cycle. You wouldn't want to subject your own children to cult conditioning, right? I still worship, and have faith. I found religions to identify with post-Mo, that are far removed from being in a cult.
_Amore
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Re: How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _Amore »

AmyJo,
In retrospect, I also can see how some things - even a few relationships - have improved since my faith crisis. By faith crisis, I mean coming to see that what I previously had faith in (the church/cult) is not what I thought. I'm happy that you've found what works better for you.

For me, many of my relationships have been very strained - and unfortunately still are and may always be. It sucks. It's very painful and I have to fight against the temptation to poison myself with anger and unrealistic expectations.
_AmyJo
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Re: How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _AmyJo »

Amore wrote:AmyJo,
In retrospect, I also can see how some things - even a few relationships - have improved since my faith crisis. By faith crisis, I mean coming to see that what I previously had faith in (the church/cult) is not what I thought. I'm happy that you've found what works better for you.

For me, many of my relationships have been very strained - and unfortunately still are and may always be. It sucks. It's very painful and I have to fight against the temptation to poison myself with anger and unrealistic expectations.


All of my church relationships suffered after I left the cult. I don't consider they were healthy from the start.

In other cultures outside Mormonism people can be free to be a Methodist, Amish, Lutheran, Catholic - and still co-exist with their neighbors without their religious differences coming between them.

With Mormonism, it's all or nothing. You can't have it in the middle. Since no other religion comes close to the "only true church" on the face of the earth (a hallmark of a cult and definition thereof,) Mormons will always consider their non-Mormon friends and family as having a faith crisis, because we're ALL wrong to begin with.

That's pure cult logic for you.

Most of my still LDS family and I get along, at a distance. We aren't close, but then weren't when I was still LDS. It's a church that doesn't foster genuine family ties because all relationships are centered around the gospel (cult religion) rather than families or people as individuals in their own right. You take away the church from the center of that universe, the relationship crumbles.

It's a false perspective, but the only one many Mormons know. That has, truth be told, affected my LDS family relationships. My relationship with self and how I see my faith and spiritual life has only gotten better because I base it now more on thoughtful reflection instead of rote, simplistic teachings that have no application in the real world for me, if they ever did.

I used to feel like I was starving as a LDS, in a spiritual vacuum. It was an isolating feeling, and terrifying because it was deep inside at the heart of me, where my soul knew it was empty and crying out for something the church teachings were not giving me.

I haven't felt that since I left it. Even though I still don't believe I've found what is truth or a replacement religion per se, it is superior to that. I practice Judaism now, not because I no longer believe in Jesus the Christ, because I do. It's because in Judaism is a religion you can ask questions, and the questions are more important than the answers.

Christ was a Jew all of his life. So I figure if being a Jew was good enough for him, it's good enough for me too. :)
_Amore
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Re: How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _Amore »

AmyJo,
You're right about many things - the church is their god - so it comes before God and family. Superficial friendships haven't bothered me as much as the relationship I have with my husband, sisters and mom. Those have hurt and still are hurting a lot.

My impression of Judaism is that it's more intellectual, some "letter of the law" issues and heavy tradition. I'm curious - besides the importance of asking questions, what aspects of Judaism have you especially resonated with?
_AmyJo
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Re: How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _AmyJo »

Amore wrote:AmyJo,
You're right about many things - the church is their god - so it comes before God and family. Superficial friendships haven't bothered me as much as the relationship I have with my husband, sisters and mom. Those have hurt and still are hurting a lot.

My impression of Judaism is that it's more intellectual, some "letter of the law" issues and heavy tradition. I'm curious - besides the importance of asking questions, what aspects of Judaism have you especially resonated with?


It resonates with the deeper chambers of my soul. That's something I couldn't find in Mormonism (it left me hollow!) Other religions were okay ... that were Christ centered. But there again, are many what I consider to be false teachings as in unbiblical. Mormonism takes it to a new level of false, as in unbiblical teachings.

I used to base my time in a Christian church by whether there was a spirit there of love and goodwill. Some churches there were literally a dead spirit residing within, that was palpable. If the spirit was not there as in withdrawn (I believe that God does withdraw his spirit from certain denominations based on heretical teachings,) then we'd go to another.

At Mormon church where I was raised, it was all I knew for the first half of my life. So of course all other religions were false based on my errant understanding of being brought up inside a cult. It does make it harder to search after leaving a cult than another mainstream religion. I believe this is why so many former LDS end up as Atheist or New Age, because they don't trust a God or the Bible having been lied to already by the LDS one.

I have a strange birthright. On my dad's side are LDS all the way back to Joseph Smith. Then on my mother's side I'm Jewish by descent of Jewish mothers, going back centuries. The odds of being born a Mormon are less than 1% of the population. So too are the odds of being born a Jew, less than 1% of the population. I'm not sure where that places me having been born both at the same time?

It meant for me that after years of searching for some religion to "join," I learned I'm not a joiner since leaving/resigning from the Mormon cult. Being Jewish is something I already was, I just needed to grow into it (my Jewish identity.)

There are many Mormon converts to Judaism, however. I just didn't need to do that since I was born Jewish through my mother's side. It's a religion that speaks to my heart. Although I am kind of turned off by all religions still, even though I do believe in God, the Bible, and the Messiah - based on my faulty and finite understanding. I don't care much for any institutionalized religion anymore, including Judaism. I go there to worship for prayer services and schmooze with some of the people for kiddush. I find the prayers beneficial, and being able to identify with another religion outside of Mormonism that helps me find my spiritual identity that once was a Mormon identity. Now it's a Jewish identity. Being Jewish is a more rich heritage in my opinion than Mormonism - and the well spring for Christianity and Islam that followed.

It has a "solid" foundation, in other words. Whereas I see Mormonism's foundation is built on sand (maybe even quicksand!)
_Amore
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Re: How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _Amore »

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and experiences, AmyJo. I've met some very nice people who were Jewish, and I love Frankl's book, "Man's search for meaning."

My understanding is that you must be born or marry into Judaism. I took my kids to synagogue in slc, to educate them and teach them to respect other valid paths to God/spirituality. When the lady conducting was about to walk around ceremonially with the scrolls, she said, "Follow me" and looked at me and added, "but only if you're Jewish." Or something like that. It reminded me of the self-righteous exclusion that Mormonism fosters. Do you think that's normal, and am I understanding this right?
_AmyJo
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Re: How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _AmyJo »

Amore wrote:Thanks for sharing your thoughts and experiences, AmyJo. I've met some very nice people who were Jewish, and I love Frankl's book, "Man's search for meaning."

My understanding is that you must be born or marry into Judaism. I took my kids to synagogue in Salt Lake City, to educate them and teach them to respect other valid paths to God/spirituality. When the lady conducting was about to walk around ceremonially with the scrolls, she said, "Follow me" and looked at me and added, "but only if you're Jewish." Or something like that. It reminded me of the self-righteous exclusion that Mormonism fosters. Do you think that's normal, and am I understanding this right?


That sounds like exclusiveness on her part. Not all, nor are most Jews that way.

They're not all the same. My great and great great grandmothers are buried in the oldest Jewish cemetery there in SLC, Utah. They went to the old downtown Reform synagogue decades before it was sold off and converted into an interior design studio. It's still a historical landmark there in SLC.

I attend synagogue with a woman who went to the SLC synagogue for 15 winters straight with her 2nd husband. They spent their winters there to go skiing. He's deceased now, and she's in her late 80's. But she loved going there when she did.

They advertise that "all are welcome." I wonder if the person was just being a pernicious snob? I find a handful of those among the Jews I now worship with. By and large more of them are not that way. We have several converts where I worship. Mostly women who've come from other religions, or none at all.

I went with my grandma to the Salt Lake City synagogue (when it was still downtown,) mid-1970's to explore our Hebrew roots together. After the service, the rabbi talked to us for a little while. Grandma wasn't Mormon but I was. He told us that many of their converts there in Salt Lake City were LDS. And that they regarded the Mormon church as one of the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel.

That didn't mean much to my grandmother, but it did to me, being a Mormon. He also told us since her mother was Jewish, so was she. She'd been orphaned at age 6, and raised by Protestant aunts. The synagogue we went to in SLC was the same synagogue her mother had taken her to up until she died prematurely (age 34.) Grandma was sent to live with her aunts in Menlo Park, CA to be raised after that. When her and grandpa were married, they eventually moved back to Utah. He was a never Mo who despised Mormons his whole life.

When my mom converted (I was a young child then,) grandpa stopped talking to her for 14 years. He only started talking to her again on his deathbed. That's how much he detested Mormons. He was a Mason, who was buried with full Masonic rites in Ogden when he died.

Back to grandma though. She tugged at my sleeve during the synagogue service to whisper to me that it was the same synagogue her mom had taken her to. She hadn't been in it since she was a young child. If not for me and her going there together to explore our Jewish roots, she wouldn't have returned and experienced that. It was like a homecoming of sorts for grandma! She recognized the stained glass windows high up in the Cathedral walls she used to study as a child while she sat there with her mother and grandmother. :)
_Amore
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Re: How has your faith crisis affected your relationships?

Post by _Amore »

AmyJo,
That's sweet about you and your grandma. I imagine, at least to some degree, being in that synagogue, and maybe Judaism in general makes you feel like you have a large family where you belong. But it's sad about your mom and her dad not speaking because of religious differences.

Just tonight I was speaking with a marital couple who refuse to speak to each other, and it's been going on for a while - meanwhile all their kids are probably the ones hurt the most. I think pride really gets the best of people - there's this false notion that the "other" one is the bad guy. My grandma used to say when you point a finger at someone, 4 others are pointing at you. It's hard to swallow pride and eat humble pie, but if both do, things can be so much better. Just sad when you see families torn apart for stupid reasons. So much needless suffering.
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