How to Handle Missionaries After Leaving the Church

Former members of the Church. Let's talk about the frustration you feel whenever you find yourselves interacting with missionaries against your will.

Y'all hate when people knock on your door. You hate that your consent to withdraw is never respected. You hate when toxic messaging shows up uninvited.

And yes. You could choose to spread the emotional contagion around by taking those frustrations out on a couple of 18 year old strangers. You could try lashing out at the institution that has hurt you via the person who is now, and will probably always be, powerless to change the situations you're actually mad about.

And I understand the temptation. Believe me. When you've set boundaries, added your name to the ward's Do Not Contact list, or even taken you name off the records of the Church, and you still have missionaries showing up at your house. It's frustrating! Especially when you've done your best to decline politely, communicating with them as an adult by saying "The way you can serve me best right now is making sure you and others at church don't come to see me anymore."

You've done all the right things. But in the endless shuffle of missionaries coming and going, leadership changes, and unit boundary shuffling, they're still showing up.

But let me tell you a secret about being a missionary, from someone who served a mission.

Rather than wasting your energy getting angry at this situation, you could choose to occupy a permanent space in their head instead.

Do you know who haunts me still and keeps me up at night a decade later?

The people who were abused and abandoned by the Church who told me their stories. The ones who made me think, for the first time, "This isn't okay. This shouldn't be happening. They deserve better than this." Those are the moments that made me realize that as long as the Church won't serve everyone, it can't save everyone.

There was a gay man in my first area in Brazil who joined a different church after coming out to his family. We ran into him at a grocery store. We'd seen him before because part of his family was still active. He was a returned missionary. He loved God. He loved being part of a church community. And in the middle of the grocery store, he just started telling us his story.

What became obvious to me is that he never wanted to leave the Church. There was a very real part of him that still wanted to come back.

"How can I be there, being what I am?"

That question is forever carved into the side of my brain.

He did that. He changed my life forever in that moment. That was the first time I really understood what the Church loses, the harm it does, by refusing to affirm our LGBTQ+ community in full fellowship.

I cried myself to sleep that night because I wanted so badly to snap my fingers and make the Church better in this one way, and I just couldn't. There was nothing I could do for him. And he made me realize that in a way I can never deny again.

Because he chose to engage with me as a person, it gave me the opportunity to do the same with him. That interaction has permanently changed who I've become as a member of the Church. For the rest of my life, I'm different now because one former member of the Church chose to tell me his story.

Former members of the Church don't owe those who stay that emotional labor. But if you're in a situation where whatever combination of circumstances has brought missionaries to your door, it's worth remembering you have a choice in how you respond. And who knows? Maybe you have exactly the right message a young Elder or Sister needs to learn, and they can only learn it from you.

Why I'm Still Trying

I've talked quite a bit about how I've arrived on the other side of my crisis of certainty and the fuller embrace of my faith. I don't want to call this a "Why do I stay?" because that implies that I'm physically present on some consistent basis.

It's more like "Why am I still trying?"

The answer may not be profoundly feminist or original. But it's the truth. My husband and I have our own weird little corner of Mormonism that we occupy together. Our own private planet where our beliefs and experiences have a life of their own.

Because of his sense of humor, he's allergic to ever taking anything too seriously. He loves an irreverent joke. His favorite thing is when someone pops off with nonsense in sacrament meeting because he finds it endlessly funny. He goes to church, in part, to laugh at people.

As an uptight overachiever in recovery, I can't express to you how unnaturally this came to me. To me, Church was not for laughing. Church was for doing serious things for serious people who are serious because that is correct. 

So much of what bothers me about the Church experience doesn't phase him because he doesn't care at all about what other people think. I can't express to you how little he cares that there are people at Church who are openly ridiculous in what they say and do. He says to me over and over again, "They aren't why I go." What this means is our shared religious life stays largely between us. Other people aren't a part of it. It's just us, discussing thoughts and ideas together in a shared language of belief.

When institutional Church became unbearable for me to sit through, I still had him and our weird little space together. He didn't withdraw that from me. He didn't try to force orthodoxy on me. He just gave me the space to figure out my own inner world and shared in it with me.

I've seen a lot of cases where Mormonism becomes another thing that pulls a couple apart when one of them chooses to distance themselves from the institutional Church. My husband never did that to me. He didn't let that happen to us. He went through it with me. I'm not the same person I was when we got married. I will probably never be that person again. He didn't view that as some violation of some contract we had. I don't owe him that. Change is part of the messy business of being human. He'd be the first person to tell you that.

I don't want the version of Mormonism that doesn't believe in science or vaccination, endorses insurrection, disrespects women, and turns a blind eye to racism and the torture of LGBTQ+ people. I want the version of Mormonism that exists in my home, where none of that is welcome. I want to inhabit the version of Mormonism that lives in my husband's heart, where respect, equality, and good sense are paramount. Where nobody is ever a second-class citizen, least of all me. 

Why do I believe there is a future in the Church I'm willing to try for? Because I see it, fully embodied, in the person my husband already is, and in the person he's becoming. 

In our home, we don't have to wait for some unknowable future to see it. It's already here.

Is the Holy Ghost also Heavenly Mother?

Some of my dearest friends believe the Holy Ghost and Heavenly Mother are the same. It's a valid question and discussion, and I thought I would share my perspective and reasoning for why I disagree.

You may think differently after all this. You may still think Heavenly Mother is the Holy Ghost. That's cool. I like being able to reason together, based on what we know and have personally experienced. You don't have to change what you believe based on what I've said. My purpose here isn't to say to anyone "You're wrong." It's to add another way of thinking about things to the discussion. Add what makes sense to you to your cafeteria tray. Or don't. It's your call.

The reason I don't share this belief is because the Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit without a body, as described in D&C 130:22. That's how they can perform the essential functions of the Holy Ghost. D&C 130 explains that for the Holy Ghost to perform the function assigned to them by God, being disembodied is a crucial part of that.

Heavenly Mother is a resurrected, exalted being. For her to be a co-creator, equal with God and in full possession of her powers, she must possess a perfected body. 

One of the unique messages of Mormonism is that exaltation is inseparable from having a resurrected, exalted body. From D&C 76 and its descriptions of "bodies celestial" to the description in Abraham 3 of those who "keep their second estate" having "glory added upon their heads for ever and ever." Removing Heavenly Mother from her embodied physical state would put her into an unequal relationship with our Father in Heaven, incomplete and subject to him. That's why the Prophet Joseph Smith taught that "all beings who have bodies have power over those who have not."

He, She, or They?

This point, however, does raise an interesting question I've never considered before. Is it appropriate for someone who has never received a body, and therefore never experienced gender in the flesh, to be assigned as male?

The Gift, Walter Rane

 

I've explored the relationship between biological sex and gender before. Being familiar with that perspective will help elaborate my comments here.

I know what the family proclamation says about gender being eternal. The language being used there has expanded and changed since 1995 when the family proclamation was given. When they said gender is eternal, they were referring to what we would now describe as biological sex. The family proclamation asserts that biological sex is eternal.

Gender is completely separate from biological sex. Gender is a social construct that is shaped by our own responses to our biological sex. Does our sex match how we perceive ourselves and our lived experiences in our own bodies, or are they incongruent with each other? That's not something that can be determined just by looking at someone. While leaders and the authors of scripture in times past have seen the Holy Ghost in vision, described him as male, or quoted Christ in teaching the Holy Ghost is male, these are secondhand accounts. I don't consider them definitive sources

Some of my dearest friends believe the Holy Ghost and Heavenly Mother are the same. It's a valid question and discussion, and I thought I would share my perspective and reasoning for why I disagree.

You may think differently after all this. You may still think Heavenly Mother is the Holy Ghost. That's cool. I like being able to reason together, based on what we know and have personally experienced. You don't have to change what you believe based on what I've said. My purpose here isn't to say to anyone "You're wrong." It's to add another way of thinking about things to the discussion. Add what makes sense to you to your cafeteria tray. Or don't. It's your call.

The reason I don't share this belief is because the Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit without a body, as described in D&C 130:22. That's how they can perform the essential functions of the Holy Ghost. D&C 130 explains that for the Holy Ghost to perform the function assigned to them by God, being disembodied is a crucial part of that.

Heavenly Mother is a resurrected, exalted being. For her to be a co-creator, equal with God and in full possession of her powers, she must possess a perfected body. One of the unique messages of Mormonism is that exaltation is inseparable from having a resurrected, exalted

Some of my dearest friends believe the Holy Ghost and Heavenly Mother are the same. It's a valid question and discussion, and I thought I would share my perspective and reasoning for why I disagree.

You may think differently after all this. You may still think Heavenly Mother is the Holy Ghost. That's cool. I like being able to reason together, based on what we know and have personally experienced. You don't have to change what you believe based on what I've said. My purpose here isn't to say to anyone "You're wrong." It's to add another way of thinking about things to the discussion. Add what makes sense to you to your cafeteria tray. Or don't. It's your call.

The reason I don't share this belief is because the Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit without a body, as described in D&C 130:22. That's how they can perform the essential functions of the Holy Ghost. D&C 130 explains that for the Holy Ghost to perform the function assigned to them by God, being disembodied is a crucial part of that.

Heavenly Mother is a resurrected, exalted being. For her to be a co-creator, equal with God and in full possession of her powers, she must possess a perfected body. One of the unique messages of Mormonism is that exaltation is inseparable from having a resurrected, exalted body. From D&C 76 and its descriptions of "bodies celestial" to the description in Abraham 3 of those who "keep their second estate" having "glory added upon their heads for ever and ever." Removing Heavenly Mother from her embodied physical state would put her into an unequal relationship with our Father in Heaven, incomplete and subject to him. 

That's why the Prophet Joseph Smith taught that "all beings who have bodies have power over those who have not." 

body. From D&C 76 and its descriptions of "bodies celestial" to the description in Abraham 3 of those who "keep their second estate" having "glory added upon their heads for ever and ever." Removing Heavenly Mother from her embodied physical state would put her into an unequal relationship with our Father in Heaven, incomplete and subject to him. 

That's why the Prophet Joseph Smith taught that "all beings who have bodies have power over those who have not." 

of this information because they weren't written, preserved, or translated by impartial bastions of gender equity.

Because the Holy Ghost has never had a body, they don't know what their gender is. This is why we refer to the Holy Ghost as a personage of spirit, rather than a person. It's also why I think the most accurate pronoun to use for the Holy Ghost is "they," rather than "he." There are too many ways that biological sex and gender can manifest in humans for me to ever assume I know what it'll be for someone who has never even been mortal before. That's a decision the Holy Ghost has to make for themselves once they receive a body. 

So what is it going to take for me to feel like I know the Holy Ghost enough to definitively assign pronouns to them? The same way I do with anyone else: by having the person introduce themselves to me and tell me firsthand what pronouns they prefer.

We don't have anything like that from the Holy Ghost. It's unwise to misrepresent the scriptures we have as if they are. And if the idea of the Holy Ghost deciding, in the actual experience of being embodied, to come out as queer bothers you, it might be time ask yourself why.

Holy Envy: Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg

Back around Passover, Rabbi Dnya Ruttenberg taught me a lesson I didn't know I needed. She talked about how a necessary part of reaching the promised land is going through the desert. That's one of the lessons she's learned from observing Passover.

That had a profound impact on me. One of those moments where you think, "This is exactly what I needed to hear. I don't know what I'm about to go through, or why I need this. But this is going to stick with me because it's where I'm headed in life."

And sure enough, it didn't take long. The need to find a new place to live because we can't stay where we are has arrived. The uncertain future. The changes in circumstances. The preparations to leave when you have no idea where you're going or how to get there. That's where I am in the temporal realities of my life right now. But I'm also realizing that it's a good representation of where my spirituality is too. I am in the desert, the in-between of where I was and where I'll eventually end up.

The way I lived before, the person I was when I trusted in the institutional church wholly and without thought, is gone. I've left that place in my religious life and there is no going back. Part of this is because of hurtful experiences I've had with other members who didn't treat me with the respect I deserved. Part of it is because of questions and frustrations I have that I can't resolve, and no one else can resolve for me. Well, no one except God. And God is choosing not to answer those questions for me. At least not here and now.

There are answers I want that I may never get. Like many who perished in the desert during the forty year Exodus, there are deserts I may never return from.

Because I'm Mormon and our whole premise is "Ask, Seek, Knock," we don't really have a paradigm in place for questions with no answers, for deserts without end. For promised lands we never see. To find those insights, I had to look outside my own tradition.

There are problems I want resolved in my life that will never be resolved. It's not because I failed. It's not because I did anything wrong. I'm human, having a human experience. Nothing about being religious will ever change that. So why bother believing or observing?

The answer I've arrived at may not satisfy anyone else. But it satisfies me.

I genuinely believe in the reality of the experiences I've had with what I understand God to be: a sentient, benevolent presence outside of myself who talks to me, especially when I'm in need. I turn to that naturally and instinctively. I always have. I probably always will.

Mormonism doesn't have a monopoly on that, nor do I think it's the place where all people will have their needs met or their prayers answered. But somehow, it is for me. Their process of seeking out continual revelation from a living God who speaks and listens serves me best. That doesn't mean my life will be perfect or free from deserts. It doesn't mean I have the promise of certainty in anything. I'm accepting more every day that I have no such promise. Clarity and certainty of the Church are not mine anymore, and they may never be again.

I don't claim to "know" the Church is true anymore, that its leaders are inspired, that their choices are correct, that the relationships we have here will continue beyond the grave. I don't know any of that. I felt I did once, but I don't anymore. I don't "know" these things are true, like we're accustomed to saying in testimony meetings. I thought I could settle into saying I "believe" they're true, but even that feels distant from where I am right now.

But this is where my hope lives. I hope we have a living prophet who is what he claims to be. I hope that continual revelation is real, that its processes will overturn so much of the injustice that exists in the institutional church. I still hope many things about the Church are true. I'm okay with that.

The only things I truly believe anymore, even though I can't prove them with anything tangible, is that I have Heavenly Parents who love me. I believe I have a Savior in Jesus Christ. I believe in the power of prayer and that God answers some prayers, sometimes.

I used to think the erosion of my certainty about the restored gospel was a problem to be solved. With enough time and patience, surely someone (God, prophets, apostles, presidencies, etc.) with more power than I had would take them from me. Today, I'm embracing faith: the believing without evidence in things which are hoped for, but not seen. That may be where I spend the rest of my life, an exodus into the desert I never emerge from.

But I'm okay with that because it's changing the way I live. I see the world and people in it differently. I am less certain I have the solutions to everyone else's problems, which makes it easier to listen and admit when I don't know something. I have a compassion and awareness of people outside of myself I never had before. I may have lost the sense of security I find in certainty, opening me to new fear. But with that greater capacity for fear has come a more profound love for everyone and everything around me.

If being unsure if anything lasts forever means I appreciate and savor here and now that much better, I'm okay if I never recover that certainty. I see the wisdom from the God I believe in that this may have been the better way to live all along. I was just too busy being certain I knew everything to see it.