Anybody miss church here?

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Nope.

[_Blixa]

Anything I might miss about church is no longer a part of it.

[_hugh jass]

I still go, but since I've stepped out into the light, I'll tell you what I really, really miss. Talking with someone without always being on guard. I miss just shootin' the breeze with no thought about being offensive or getting "outed". Being a non-believer is hard among the believing.

But it isn't any better at work. I'm not in Utah so almost noone is Mormon and they just don't "get" my situation. They can't relate to why I'm so alone.

So just talking with someone is what I miss.

Sounds rough, Ten Bear. I'll pray for ya.

WTF?

How would this silly prayer sound?

Dear heabenly fodder,

Tank you for dis lovely fall weather and for bring us dis early wintoe snow for our crops next summer(even though we buy food shipped in from as far as South America).

Pweease bweess my prented friend TEN BEAR from the apostate boawd. He rwwweee rwwwee needs ur sweet swiwit to hep him back to thy choich.

I say deez dings in the name of cheese and rice, Amen.


SERIOUSLY???

If praying for someone that you don't even know their real name makes you feel superior and needed then I guess have at it.

But know this you peeping twit, praying does nothing for the other party.

[_Hades]

I don't miss a thing about the church. I'm pretty sure I would get queasy just stepping into the building. I love freedom. My particular personality does not do well with any system that tells you how to live your life 24 hours a day.

I do miss having a close relationship with my mother, my brothers and sisters and their families. They're cordial, but I'm the crazy apostate brother. They pray for me daily hoping for my return. I hope daily that they will wake up and smell the coffee. I guess that's just life and the human condition.

[_moksha]

Harmony had a good post tangentially relating to this question on another board. She said she missed the activities of the past and laments that they are now being done away with sans activity committees. I heartily agreed that I will miss the pot lucks.

[_moksha]

When I am absent, the part I miss the most is the fifteen minute Sacramental Communion Service. I also miss saying hi to neighbors when entering the Chapel and the announcements in Priesthood and updates on the missionaries from the ward.

[_sock puppet]

I don't miss a thing about the church. I'm pretty sure I would get queasy just stepping into the building. I love freedom. My particular personality does not do well with any system that tells you how to live your life 24 hours a day.

When I've set foot in a Mormon ward or stake building in the last 15 years--for funerals--it has seemed nothing more than bricks and mortar. For the first 10 years of my apostasy, there still was some lingerie respect I had for the fact that people went there to worship what they held sacred. Since that high water mark of 10 years, they have just become buildings. There's a staleness, in the smell of the carpet and pew benches, in the decor, in the nearly worn-out "Sunday best" clothes they wear, and in the different protocols in the foyer, as they file into the chapel, and how they conduct their meetings and themselves in their meetings. It is all foreign to me know. My freedom and the smell of coffee are more part of me now than the LDS Church once was.

I question the powers of observation or ability to be honest with themselves of those that try to dismiss Dr Shade's dichotomy between Chapel Mormons and Internet Mormons as any other than spot-on and insightful.

[_Fence Sitter]

I miss church every Sunday.

[_Jersey Girl]

The only thing I miss about church are the lovely intimate candlelight services on Christmas eve and Silent Night played on the guitar.

They no longer do it like that, the church is far too big to be intimate now, all the people I was friendly with at church are still friendly to me, including my former pastor who has been gone from there for years.

So, no, I don't miss church.

[_Wisdom Seeker]

I have often wondered why leaving Mormonism has made me so much happier. It is probably because nothing in Mormonism brought me happiness, satisfaction, fulfillment or answers.

I don't miss any aspect of Mormonism, even less the church services. Boring and uninspiring mostly.

When I have popped my head into an LDS service (for a baby blessing, usually), I get a terrible sense of dread and despair, like I have gone back in time to some medieval, superstitious place.

I find it best to keep at least a 100 yard distance from any LDS church house for sanities sake.

A good friend of mine is returning to church activity after a 10 year hiatus. He told me that he can never believe again but has found a woman who wants him to go to church with her. He told me that he really likes the social aspect of church, but does not like the doctrine of the church. I thought I should recommend the NOM site to him, but after he told me that they are planning on getting married, I told him it probably would be easier to find a way to believe (at least the good parts). I asked him if he could pretend the world was flat for the sole purpose of being happy in a relationship, and he said yes. I then told him he should fit in just fine.