The fragility of Testimony

[Hagoth]

John Dehlin says he has an upcoming interview with a church employee/insider who claims that ultra-conservative members are leaving the church at much higher rates than are leaving over liberal issues. Specifically, they cannot stomach a prophet who encourages vaccinations.

It seems like all kinds of Mormons are teetreing in various direction. People who stick their heads just outside the bubble, pretty much in any direction, are encountering guillotines. This fits into a bigger picture of the surprisingly fine line between thinking you are fully committed for eternity and saying, "wait a minute..." Upshot: testimonies are much weaker than Mormons like to think.

I'm very interested to see who Dehlin's guest is and what they have to say.

[alas]

Very interesting. Please return and report.

Remember the leaked briefing with the bubbles of why people leave? The right had about as many as the left did between the Snuffer followers and such. Well, with the prophet falling for the lefts deceptive vaccines with micro chips imbedded in them there is now one more reason for far right Trumpers to follow Trump rather than the false prophet, so I am not a bit surprised that the church is losing more right wing nut jobs than us left wing nut jobs. We are just more aware of the very good reasons that we have, so we tend to think our reasons are legitimate while thinking the prophet has gone off his rocker for getting vaccinated is just plain crazy. Think how much the church has changed lately with things like changes to the temple ceremony and actually hobnobbing with the NAACP and the right has more reason to be unhappy with the church right now than those to the left.

But in a way, I think there is one thing we all have in common that really explains the high rate of church defection. That sense of community that used to hold the church together in spite of our differences is gone, so it is much easier to find things “wrong” that are worth leaving over no matter which side of the political/intellectual/religious spectrum you start on.

This was one thing the church left off it’s chart when considering why people leave, this idea that they were not really connected to begin with. The church has failed to get people feeling that sense of community, it failed to be fun, inspiring, intellectually challenging, socially engaging, or anything worthwhile. It got so wrapped up in how it could use the members to gain wealth, keep the buildings clean and how the members could serve the church that it forgot that it had a job to meet the members needs. It forgot how to minister to the members. It forgot that adults need friends, need fun, need spiritual guidance, spiritual nourishment, intellectual stimulation, involvement. It was so worried about the (male) youth that they neglected everybody else. This church is high cost, both financially and the time commitment, but with all that cost it forgot that members need something in return on their investment. They took and they took, burning out the workers and still demanding more, and then wonder why people leave. Well, duh.

[blazerb]

But in a way, I think there is one thing we all have in common that really explains the high rate of church defection. That sense of community that used to hold the church together in spite of our differences is gone, so it is much easier to find things “wrong” that are worth leaving over no matter which side of the political/intellectual/religious spectrum you start on.

I think that a true church could not function with one or even a dozen prophets. A true church would need about 10 million prophets around the world, both men and women from all sorts of cultural backgrounds. None of us can have a connection to a few men who are as concerned with the church's stock portfolio as with maintaining membership numbers. And neither of those activities provides the pastoral care that people need from a religious community. The church has gotten too big to have personal relationships with the leadership, and it does not have the strong cultural history that can hold the Catholic church together with its hierarchy. It also does not want to have the kind of grass roots participation that mainline protestants have. It seems to me that the church's structure has hit the limits of what it can support.

[Hagoth]

... it failed to be fun, inspiring, intellectually challenging, socially engaging, or anything worthwhile.

That's an excellent point. When I was a kid most of our fun social activities were provided by the church. Now you just get more church, and there are so many more interesting things vying for kids' attention these days. The Marvel Universe vs. temple prep class?

Guilt and shame are now the main handles the church has for keeping young people clinging on, and fewer are falling for it.

[Cnsl1]

These are excellent points, you smart people. This matches experiences that I have. I used to enjoy Sunday School, with the teachers that asked good questions and inspired deep thinking, and conversations that happened in the hallways. The last few years i attended SS, and I've not attended once in probably 3 or 4 years, featured bland, regurgitated drivel accompanied by 2 or 3 well meaning stallwarts who kept the speculators at bay, plus the harbinger of second coming signage who has to tell everyone each week how bad the world is getting.

I work with kids as a part of my day job and have had more than 1 Mormon kid wonder aloud to me whether or not it really mattered what they planned to do after high school since obviously the second coming would already be here or that there would be so many wars and destruction that it wouldn't matter anyway. I just tell them they were saying the same things when I was a kid, so better have a plan and get some education of some kind or another, and tell your grandkids to do the same.

In my very conservative nonUtah community I'm also seeing several Mormons who seem to be a bit more excited about Donald the Rump than Rusty the Half Polygamist Nelson (i say half because his wives aren't sharing him yet). In this area, I'm seeing what many of you describe; there serm to be far more increasingly disgruntled Trumpage Mormons than upset NOMish liberals. Based on my limited observations, the majority of active conservative Mormons are still toeing the line and following the prophet (well, maybe except for masks at church-- unless they're on the stand, because obviously that's where you have to set the example-- unless you're actually speaking then you can take it off), so I'm not predicting a mass exodus of Republigun Marmins anytime soon.

If you were one of the Q15 leading this corporation, would you spend more efforts reclaiming the super conservative sheep, and risk offending pretty much everyone else in the world, or try to round up the liberals and make nice with the blacks and LGBTQ+ and surely lose a good bit of the ones with all the guns?

Or would you just try to keep the cash cow mooing down the middle of the road and distract everyone with new "revelations" that are about as exciting as what you find in the middle of the road in Arizona--yellow lines and dead jackrabbits.

[Just This Guy]

Conservative reason VS. Liberal reason.

I could be off base here, but I would expect these conservative reasons to be flashes in a pan. Something like covid vaccination, Yes a lot of people get worked up over the LDSinc. suggestion people get them and leave. But eventually covid will run it's course and go away. Denver Snuffer and Rock Waterman are popular for a while but they loose their clout and new followers diminish.

Whereas liberal cases (Truth claims, history, LGBT/Blacks treatment, etc. ) are more of a constant drain. These issue are there constantly and don't go away.

Each has their spike and valleys, but in the long run, what one is the bigger drain? Slow and stead or Fast and short?

Another question is for a conservative reason, how likely are these people to come back after things settle down? If someone leave Mormonism over a Covid vaccine, when covid ends and the vaccine becomes a non-issue, will they come back to their old community?

[alas]

Conservative reason VS. Liberal reason.

I could be off base here, but I would expect these conservative reasons to be flashes in a pan. Something like covid vaccination, Yes a lot of people get worked up over the LDSinc. suggestion people get them and leave. But eventually covid will run it's course and go away. Denver Snuffer and Rock Waterman are popular for a while but they loose their clout and new followers diminish.

Whereas liberal cases (Truth claims, history, LGBT/Blacks treatment, etc. ) are more of a constant drain. These issue are there constantly and don't go away.

Each has their spike and valleys, but in the long run, what one is the bigger drain? Slow and stead or Fast and short?

Another question is for a conservative reason, how likely are these people to come back after things settle down? If someone leave Mormonism over a Covid vaccine, when covid ends and the vaccine becomes a non-issue, will they come back to their old community?

Interesting thoughts. And I am not sure about the answer, it could be that conservative reasons are of short term duration. They seem that way to me, as well as slightly to very irrational. I mean how stupid is it to think that your small pox vaccine and polio vaccine and mumps/measles/rubella were all good science but this vaccine is more dangerous than good because just look at the people dying in the hospitals with 80-90% of them being unvaccinated…obviously the vaccine isn’t doing any good. Yeah, stupid and irrational, and when they wake up to reality, they will come back to church.

But just for the sake of discussion, what if their thinking isn’t just one issue, but like us there are multiple issues. Look closer at what Snuffer says. The church has changed so much that Joseph Smith would not recognize it as anything to do with the church he started. The church is in a state of apostasy, and the vaccination isn’t their reason for leaving, so much as just a last straw. Over the years the church has slowly jettisoned the very things that made it unique and tried to prove to all those churches of the great and abominable that we are Christian *just like them*. We look for the acceptance by the great and abominable. We want to impress the “whore of all the earth” that we are just like them, so we drop things out of our doctrine, and quietly stop teaching that a Pres Hinckley denies on TV that we hope to become Gods ourselves. The church seems to slowly be abandoning Republican principles, like worshipping Trump as the guy who will return ‘Merica back to Christianity and save us from the child molesting Democrats. Then Pres Nelson proves it be getting Bill Gates micro chip embedded in his arm. See, it isn’t one thing, but a pattern of moving away from Truth.

When I try too see the world through their eyes, it just seems crazy to me. But they think that I am the crazy evil apostate, so I suppose that makes us even.