This is for encouragement, ideas, and support for people going through a faith transition no matter where you hope to end up. This is also the place to laugh, cry, and love together.
Rational of this Study
The purpose of this study is to understand how individual and relational factors impact coping during the process of transitioning out of the LDS faith. This research will be used to help clinicians be better equipped to support the LDS population who make a faith transition. This research aim makes it necessary to work only with participants who have made an exit from the LDS faith. We are defining a faith exit as someone who previously identified as a member of the LDS faith and now does not.
“You have learned something...That always feels at first as if you have lost something.” George Bernard Shaw When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
That was good. I spent about 30 minutes and answered their dozen or so questions. I like how they made the latter part open input and not just multiple choice. If I had been thinking about it, I would have captured the questions and my responses and posted them up here. Maybe some other NOMer can return and report. It does not get into any dogma related questions, more along the lines of how your values, dissonance, self honesty, etc., are or were affected by the faith transition.
“Sir,' I said to the universe, 'I exist.' 'That,' said the universe, 'creates no sense of obligation in me whatsoever.”
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RubinHighlander wrote: ↑Tue Oct 25, 2022 12:46 pm
That was good. I spent about 30 minutes and answered their dozen or so questions. I like how they made the latter part open input and not just multiple choice. If I had been thinking about it, I would have captured the questions and my responses and posted them up here. Maybe some other NOMer can return and report. It does not get into any dogma related questions, more along the lines of how your values, dissonance, self honesty, etc., are or were affected by the faith transition.
I might have been in defense mode, get biased around anything church related, but it felt to me like many of the questions insinuated everyone leaves because they are sinners - do you feel guilty for leaving? do you drink now, is that why you left? are you immoral now? What is it like to live without morals? Haha, that might be an exaggeration, but is what it felt like to me.
I do not feel guilt, I do not feel shame - how do you deal with your shame? Ans - I am not guilty of anything, I do not feel shame from leaving church. I know a few members who are filled with shame/worthiness issue - not me - no guilt here.
“You have learned something...That always feels at first as if you have lost something.” George Bernard Shaw When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
My answers leaned heavily toward the notion that church-induced shame was a major limiting factor in my personal growth and mental health, and that realizing the controlling nature of that false shame was the most important factor in breaking out of my arrested development and finding actual growth and wellness.
I thought the questions could have been worded better, or at least that a better explanation of the terminology could have been provided.
“The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.” -Mark Twain
Jesus: "The Kingdom of God is within you." The Buddha: "Be your own light."
