Monday, March 31, 2008

I just don't belong here



Then I allowed myself to ask the one most forbidden question of them all: What if it's not true?

It was hard for me to ask myself this because I had been trained that doubting the truthfulness of the gospel is itself a sin. Yet I couldn't escape seeing this as the only possible conclusion.

Once I allowed myself to ask this question, the answer became painfully clear. All my life I "knew the church was true" because I had been trained to know it was true. I had no evidence. A "burning in the bosom" on the part of a few million people out of the billions on the planet did not constitute evidence for such an elaborate and nonsensical story.

I felt like I needed to get out and walk around to think. I had been so lost in my own thoughts that I had hardly noticed Janie at her own desk reading her own copy of the Book of Mormon, although perhaps not gaining quite the same insights from it as I was. I told Janie I was going for a walk. She admonished me to be careful out walking in the dark like that, and to be sure to be back before curfew. I promised to be careful, and I set off along the long and curving path back under the bridge and back up to campus. It was starting to get dark out, but the path was lit. Read the rest of the story ->

8 comments:

MoHoHawaii said...

With this thought [that not a lick of it is true], I began to feel light and excited. I caught myself running. I had a tremendous sensation of stepping out into the sunlight to see that there's a whole world out there after having lived my life in a tiny, dark cellar. I felt free.

Well, I certainly think we've all been there before. LOL.

I never went to BYU. Somehow, even when I was in the fold, I had the intuition that it would be a bad place for me. (I ended up at Inceton-Pray, which suited my personality much better.) I just didn't trust the idea of BYU. I'm glad I missed it.

C. L. Hanson said...

Good for you!!! I should have had the same intuition...

UneFemmePlusCourageuse said...

All I can say after reading this is: "Yay Lynn!"

Lars Larson said...

I really liked reading the whole argument for leaving The Church and therefore Christianity behind laid out in such a bare and forthright way. When read from the outside it seems so obvious, you know? I am always dumbfounded that it simply doesn't matter to most believers that what they believe is as silly as believing that pigs can fly.

All my post-Mormon, post-Reconciliation life I have been watchful of believing silly things and I am very sensitive to it. For example, I heard two things within two minutes of each other on NPR the other day which simply GRATED against this watchfulness. First, there was a guy who was a master kite-maker who actually SAID in a quaint doncha-know sort of way that his kites flew BETTER because he gives them NAMES before he flies them. Well, of COURSE they don't but we allow him to quaintly SAY it. Second, the news anchor mentioned HIS HOLINESS the DALAI LAMA. Why is he HOLY? Because some cadre of misguided IDIOTS chose a LITTLE KID as the REINCARNATION of some dead guy? And yet protocol dictates that we buy INTO this crap.

When will we simply LEARN?

Enjoying your book, Ms. Hanson.

(BTW typo on "Page" 78...lol)

C. L. Hanson said...

Thanks UFPC!!!

Thanks ErlyBrd!!!

To me it seems obvious that once you realize you have no reason to believe in tales of miracles, then Christianity falls in the same stroke as Mormonism. That's how it happened for me in my real-life deconversion. However, I realize that different people deconvert for different reasons.

What's the typo? I don't see it...

Lars Larson said...

No big thing...you just spelled "Paige" once like "Page"

I simply can't WAIT for the love scene, by the way. Sorry I forgot to send The Mormon Roadshow last night...a love scene of my OWN got in the way. ;-)

C. L. Hanson said...

Thanks ErlyBrd -- it's fixed now!!!

I'm really psyched about running the love scene chapter as well!! It's one of the faves among those who have read the whole book. Plus almost everyone who reads any part of the book clicks on that chapter at least once, and I hate turning them away empty-handed. Just one more week... :D

C. L. Hanson said...

p.s. I'm looking forward to reading your piece, and I hope your real-life love scene went well. :D