Has the Mormon religion ever "hurt" you or your family, in any way? —hanging in there

Absolutely, yes. It's hard to point blame at anyone in particular. Mom, Dad, bishops, mission president, my wife and family, they all believe it's "true," so that guides their actions. I see three kinds of "hurt" that come from Mormonism: (1) dysfunctional or otherwise inaccurate world view, (2) ostracism and labeling of ex-Mormons and other detractors, and (3) unnecessary guilt and suffering over imagined offenses. Unfortunately each of those is probably too big a topic to take on here, so I'll leave it at that.

Mormon missionaries keep on persisting...what to do? —L.M

I left the Mormon church when I was 15 years old. There were simply too many fundamental things (for me at least) that were wrong about that church, so that even at 15 I knew it would not work out.

However, my family continues to be Mormon, especially my mother who invites the missionaries over for dinner. They are not bad people, and I even cooked for them. But over and over they try to press me to come back to the church, to events, to read The Book of Mormon etc. etc. Every time they do this, I say "thank you, but I left the church and never regretted that decision." Now, they are sending visiting teachers, and want to call me to set up a time to discuss these issues.

I try to be nice for the sake of my family, and because they are not the worst people on earth, but they can't get the picture! Why can't Mormons let go???

L.M, it was precisely because my family is so connected with the church that I felt it necessary to resign formally and get my name removed. I wrote the family a brief letter to let them know what was happening, explained that I no longer believed without going into any specific details, and told them all I still loved them.

If your family can't respect your boundaries, cite their 11th Article of Faith: "We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may." Or better yet tell them you've left the church but the church won't leave you alone. ;)

presidentJC:
That's a pretty myopic view. Calling someone a "child of God [who] falls away to unbelief" is not helpful. Nor is it OK that the missionaries continue to disrespect others because it's "their job." The LDS church isn't really good at honoring people's personal boundaries, from proselyting to visiting teachers to "worthiness" interviews to "discussing the affairs of members constantly." She doesn't believe. Let. it. go.

Tithing Money!!!!! —ubme

Now that wifey & I are free of paying to stay in the club we have found a budget surplus.

What do we do with all that extra cash?? Well we bought a new 50K SUV to haul all our kids around in on our free weekends & do fun family stuff.

Having extra cash to buy a nice car with has another worth while purpose. DRIVING MY TBM NEIGHBORS ABSOLUTALLY NUTS, they can't figure out how we can afford a nice car & I'm not sharing my secret.

Whats everyone else done with that extra 10%?????????

Good for you, ubme. As a financial planner I'm all for giving money to causes or people that are important to you. Good for the soul and a good reminder not to be too attached to material things.

But when you're not giving out of religious compulsion, you can decide on a level of giving that makes sense for your income and savings needs. In all likelihood that level is far less than the 10% of income Mormons are used to giving. I hope the first thing you evil PostMos do after stopping the tithing drain is buy yourself something nice. But then I hope you get your 401(k) contributions up, pay off credit cards, build a small emergency fund, and then open a Roth IRA.

ETA: I posted over top of Peter_Mary, hope I didn't convince anyone NOT to contribute to PM's scholarship fund. I'm sure it's a worthy cause.

Why reject a free Book of Mormon?

Been sitting here thinking, why are people afraid to read the Book of Mormon? We have millions we can give away for free. What the heck is the harm in taking a free book and reading it? Simply reading it doesnt mean you necessarily believe it. But what do you have to lose? You read it and you don't agree, okay you've just learned something. You still benefit. But if you read it and find out that its true than you've just gained the blessings of heaven.

And the beauty of it is the book has the promise that you can ask God whether its true. No one expects you to believe it out of blind obedience. You are supposed to investigate and find out. We want you to.

Even if you think you want to reject it atleast reject it knowing what the heck it actually says without relying on other people. Make a conscious choice on your own. Find out for yourself.

Why is that so hard? —Avatar_defender_of_the_light

Been there done that. Why do you assume people are afraid to read it? I wish you could see how that sounds to outsiders. It makes you sound like a Scientologist. Speaking of which, why have you not investigated Scientology? What's the harm?

The Book of Mormon is ridiculous, and the only way you wouldn't know that is if you know nothing about ancient Mesoamerica or only trust Mormon sources.

The mormon church is going to be the 3rd largest church in the USA in 2017.?

if growth trends stay the same, the lds church will pass the United Methodist Church in just 9 short years. —falisrm

Is this based on Rodney Stark's projection from several years ago? Stark used a simple exponential algorithm to demonstrate how fast the LDS church was reportedly growing at the time. Population studies don't work that way in real life, as even Dr. Stark will tell you. All the LDS members who ate this up should note that your church has been steadily distancing itself from the "fastest growing" fallacy for some time now. There is also a huge disparity between the church's reported membership numbers and the number who self-identify as LDS.

Source(s):

http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/...
"The Church makes no statistical comparisons with other churches and makes no claim to be the fastest-growing Christian denomination despite frequent news media comments to that effect."
http://www.sltrib.com/ci_2890645
"Keeping members a challenge for LDS church"

http://www.gc.cuny.edu/faculty/research_...
American Religious Identification study lists Mormonism 10th in percentage growth, and shows net zero gain when comparing "in-switchers" and "out-switchers."

What's the best part about being a Mormon? —^_^

Johnny Lingo.