Teaching them to lie

[_GoodK]

I read the opening post.

There's another side to this story.

That shouldn't be surprising or controversial, but it will be easy to forget.

And that's all I'm going to say on this thread.

I assume you mean the story of the Mormon gulag - let me just say that you don't know any significantly accurate details to this story.

Not that that is a fault of yours. I'd be glad to share the whole story with you sometime, though. Even before I get a chance to tell the public.

Mormons and ex-Mormons alike should find common ground abolishing the church's youth gulag.

[_Inconceivable]

My father, (who is one of the most amazing of all people on the planet), is not a member. I joined the church as a child, then my mother and sibs joined as well. My father is agnostic.

Now... how does a child cope with the "fact" that her father will never be with her in heaven? What does it do to a child to tell her that she will not be with her family because her father and mother are not sealed? What does it do to a child to tell her that even if she makes it to the CK, she will be alone, without siblings or loved ones? What does it do to a child to tell her that her father is not one of the chosen, or is a sinner, or is not righteous because he has not joined the right church? And what does it do to a father/daughter relationship?

I think it is cruel.

Even if the church is true, what sort of God allows this sort of cruelty to be taught and preached to children?

Families can be together forever? Nope. :-(

td

Except for maybe the "amazing" descriptive, this is me. My amazing teenage daughter and I are close.

She is sad that I have chosen to beome an apostate but not heartbroken yet. She loves me with all her heart, as I do her. Her innocent faith would encourage her to believe that I will repent and return. I'm not coming back, but she refuses in her heart to believe this. She won't have to grieve until I die as an apostate. Then you will see my daughter with wounds as deep as the Grand Canyon - and I won't be there to comfort her. I hate this thought. Not much I can do about it unless I'm willing to become a liar. This sucks in the most miserable way.

Yes, Mormons (and some other religeons) are taught to grieve at death - for apostate family members.

[_truth dancer]

It's a dilemma. But I tend to think that parents have a more or less absolute right to to pass their beliefs, values, etc. down to their children. If fact, I'd go further and argue that this process of intergenerational belief/value transfer serve a vital function in creating stable societies. I know that stability isn't all it's cracked up to be at times (particularly when the status quo, for example, is to dehumanize women), but one can only wonder at the outcome of a process in which each succeeding generation was, in effect, a blank slate. I'm not sure that would be better, particularly in cases where values and beliefs being handed down are 'good' ones (e.g., respect for diversity, tolerance, etc.)

I agree with this.

I think it is perfectly normal and appropriate for parents to share their beliefs, but very unhealthy to condemn their children for following their individual path if it happens to be different.

I'm a big believer in the need for humans to have the continuity of a "tribe", to move in the world with support and care and concern from the village, etc. etc.

The problem I see is that the myths that have held communities together for millennia are no longer really appropriate or applicable for our time. They don't seem to be working since they are at odds with current reality and knowledge. The ancient stories/myths were based on information and understanding that may have made sense and seemed true at the time, but they were created by and for nomadic and ancient peoples whose experience of the world is nothing like ours today. I have the sense that trying to hold onto ancient myths in our modern day world leaves people lost to a large extent.

Here is my solution: Create new myths that are in line with our experiences and knowledge! Simple as that. Of course the myths would be based, as they always have been on the current understanding of existence and the universe of the time. If the people of the world embraced our new story of the universe, (the one that seems to make the most sense to our human senses and experiences, perhaps we would come together as a planetary family rather than be separated by divergent ancient stories that make no sense to anyone not indoctrinated into the particular belief?

As brilliant as we think we are, I'm pretty sure that in another few thousand years, folks will be looking upon our understanding of the universe and laughing, wondering how we could view the world in such a way. :-)

OK, sorry I'm rambling and derailing the thread here. (smile)

Back to the real topic!

td

[_Tarski]

They likely felt justified in sending me to a Mormon gulag for a year and a half - where the Mormon religion is literally forced on adolescents (for more on this, stay tuned).
.

PCS?

[_marg]

This passage made me realize I was never taught how to grieve properly.

Is there a particular way to grieve? If so I wasn't taught it being raised without religion. My mom just passed away yesterday after a progressive terminal illness COPD. My 4 brothers, and dad watched her unconscious for a few hours before she died in the hospital. She was actually put in the situation of choosing her own death. She was given basically 2 alternatives...stay on a breathing machine with a hose down her throat and live confined to a bed without being able to talk or move but have full mental faculties probably for about 7 months more at best or go off a breathing machine and likely die. She had to make the choice not the family so I grieve, feel very bad that she knew fully she was choosing to die now in a few days most likely rather than stay alive confined for a longer time. I guess every situation is unique. In her case with her deteriorating state of health and quality of life having been severely diminished as time went on over the past 5 years and it would only continue to diminish further, I don't perceive death as a horrible or worse alternative for her. I learned one of my brothers believes in an afterlife, though he's never expressed any religious belief before. Perhaps he believes in a god perhaps not, I'll ask him tomorrow. When he mentioned he believed in an afterlife I told him he was religious, and he seemed surprised at that, so I suspect a God isn't part of the equation for him.

I know I'm able to handle my mom's death without any belief in an afterlife, I know that is the case for my dad, and as far as I can tell it is the case for my other brothers besides that one.

I don't find an afterlife particularly appealing. Why should living forever in a particular 'frozen in time' state be so wonderful? From my perspective not having beliefs in the supernatural in the first place, makes it something I don't miss and I don't find I have any desire for those beliefs nor feel I am missing out on something.

I'm not sure what the grieving process does require. I suppose having beliefs in an afterlife in really living in denial, unable to accept death. And many people live in denial without involving the supernatural. It just so happens in the case of an afterlife belief denial of death involves the supernatural and that denial is promoted by many religious groups.

[_Jersey Girl]

marg,

I don't think that the grief process "requires" anything in particular. It's just that, a process. I'm sorry to hear your news.

Vicki

[_Jersey Girl]

GoodK,

I didn't fully understand what you meant to convey in your post however, I did read the quote regarding children and grief. The topic of children and grieving came up not long ago in a professional conference I attended. The message was that we do a disservice to our children when a loved one has died (even the family pet) in that instead of allowing children to grieve, we try to cheer them up. We try to make them happy and in the process, we deny them their right to grieve. Perhaps it is our own fear of losing control of our own emotions, however, isn't that the point of the grief process? To surrender to our emotions in order to recover them, to lose ourselves to them again?

I say, yes.

I have encountered many very young children who grieved. These days, I take time not only to listen to but also to write down their expressions and sometimes I cry when I take the dictation. I take the hand written dictation, type it on the computer and give them the printed copy with their name and date and put it in an envelope for them to keep or share with their parents. This shows them that their words and feelings are important.

I think that when we promote the surrendering of our emotions to love, the other side of that is surrendering our emotions to loss. If we don't allow our children to openly grieve, we rob them of acknowledging both the love and the loss as well as the beginning, middle and completion of a relationship.

[_marg]

marg,

I don't think that the grief process "requires" anything in particular. It's just that, a process. I'm sorry to hear your news.

Vicki

Thanks Vicki. I don't think I've gone through a grieving process at this point. Or I have but it's been a slow one over the years. I do wish we (my dad and I) had done a few things differently. We made decisions due to insufficient information, but we could have looked into end stage COPD before the time came and made better choices at a few critical points based on knowledge instead of ones we made based on ignorance.

[_Jersey Girl]

marg,

I don't think that the grief process "requires" anything in particular. It's just that, a process. I'm sorry to hear your news.

Vicki

Thanks Vicki. I don't think I've gone through a grieving process at this point. Or I have but it's been a slow one over the years. I do wish we (my dad and I) had done a few things differently. We made decisions due to insufficient information, but we could have looked into end stage COPD before the time came and made better choices at a few critical points based on knowledge instead of ones we made based on ignorance.

I can tell you from firsthand experience, marg, that even when a death is expected, we engage in the grief process or rather it engages us. We make the best decisions we can with what information we have at the time. That's what I know. Some day, the medical decisions that are on your mind right now, will fade and be replaced with positive memories. It's just that when someone is chronically ill, our head has been on treatment for so long that the treatments and hospitalizations become the focus of the relationship. That will fade and you'll be able to remember other and better things than this.

I suppose now would be a good time to tell you that my mother died of the same thing and I understand the nature of what you're dealing with. Part of my own grief process will be that your post here triggers memories for me too.

And that's alright with me.

[_Jersey Girl]

p.s. Some day you won't remember the sound of a ventilator. I promise.

:-)