Inactivity and "Coming out"

[_Themis]

The witnesses and me had an experience and not a warm feeling in the tummy.

So? Who thinks internal experiences can only be a warm feeling in the tummy?

[_why me]

You seem to have this huge, massive hangup about the Witnesses. Dude, it doesn't freaking matter what the Witnesses thought, or if they ever recanted, or if they had something Mormonesque engraved on their tombstones or whatever. None of that can turn a non-true church into a true one.

If Cicero feels like the time is right for him to come out, more power to him. If he doesn't feel quite right about it yet, then I think he should hold on and wait until it does. If his experiences ends up being anything like mine, in not too long he'll be used to the idea of the church not being true after all and will stop giving a crap what believers think about his apostasy. If that time isn't now, there's no hurry.

I have no hang up about the witnesses. But I am pretty impressed with their stories and with their testimonies. There was reason why 11 were chosen. 11 is a big number. One can rationalized 3 or 2 but 11. It is problematic. They had an experience that could never be forgotten or rationalized away. And as you know, we humans are great at rationalizations.

I think that cicero should bite the bullet and come out especially since he does not want to regain his testimony. No point putting it off. Will he disappoint? Yes. But life is full of disappointments and it is good to be true to one self.

And what will believers think of his apostacy. Mostly nothing. They have their own problems to deal with in daily life to be too engrossed with his apostacy. There questions are more focused on: Will I have a job? Will I have money for college? Will I still have a home in two years? Will I remain healthy? And they will be saying a lot of prayers to get them through life. But they may be concerned for him.

[_why me]

The witnesses and me had an experience and not a warm feeling in the tummy.

So? Who thinks internal experiences can only be a warm feeling in the tummy?

One of the posters who made a comment to me about warm feelings in the tummy.

[_Drifting]

Cicero,

Thank you for the OP and I sincerely hope you able to regain your testimony of the gospel.

I believe it is very difficult to maintain Mormonism or belief in it without some evidence. I personally wouldn't believe in it because its claims are absurd (as are Christian and other religious claims) without that. As I've often said, we are literally talking about people seeing God, Angels, Gold Books, people walking on water, splitting the Red Sea, crossing the oceans in boats (or submarines) thousands of years ago and so on. There just isn't any reason to believe in any of that given that those things don't and shouldn't of happened without some witness of something similar today.

For myself, I know there is a God and that this things are true and really did happen. And I know the Book of Mormon, despite its many problems, is a revealed text as is the Book of Abraham. I know that Joseph Smith, despite his many character flaws and mistakes, was a prophet of God. But to know that, one must know God and God must tell you personally that these things are true (and I'm not talking about having a feeling here). That is what you should seek. Otherwise, I'd live a good, honest life in service and kindess towards your fellow man and NOT believe it.

Tobin

Tobin, how did your exit from the Church influence your strength of testimony going back to {partially} believing in it?

[_Drifting]

I didn't have to. They saw it by my actions. And I did pay a small price for it. But I stayed true to myself and remained a good dad. And I have never forgotten that experience that I had when I prayed about the Book of Mormon.

The witnesses and me had an experience and not a warm feeling in the tummy.

But that experience hasn't been enough has it?
You don't attend Church or live Mormonism the way Mormon God explains you should via His Prophets and Apostles.

So why me, why wasn't the experience enough?

[_Sethbag]

I have no hang up about the witnesses. But I am pretty impressed with their stories and with their testimonies. There was reason why 11 were chosen. 11 is a big number. One can rationalized 3 or 2 but 11. It is problematic. They had an experience that could never be forgotten or rationalized away. And as you know, we humans are great at rationalizations.

I nominate that last sentence for Most Ironic Post Fragment of the Year.

You are easily impressed, that's all I have to say. The Lord came up with one more witness than you could count on your fingers, proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that it must be true.

I think that cicero should bite the bullet and come out especially since he does not want to regain his testimony. No point putting it off. Will he disappoint? Yes. But life is full of disappointments and it is good to be true to one self.

Sometimes there is indeed a point to putting it off. Sometimes we grab a bandage and just rip it off all at once, and sometimes we peel it up slowly to minimize the collateral damage.

[_DrW]

The Lord came up with one more witness than you could count on your fingers, proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that it (the Book of Mormon) must be true.

Great line. That certainly does it for me.

I'm headed back as of, well, maybe tomorrow.

[_Philidel]

what i've seen with people in your position is that once they take that first step out the door, a lot of uncertainty and anxiety evaporates, and their journey away from not just the LDS church, but all religious faith, accelerates.

We've been conditioned to be terrified of the thought of leaving the church but when we take that step we realize pretty quickly that it isn't the end of the world. We lose "friends" but then who wants friends whose friendship depends on your religious faith?

This was essentially my experience. I must own, though, that it came before I married. My parents and siblings had their own issues to distract them from my loss of faith. So I didn't risk losing family members.

[_Darth J]

There was reason why 11 were chosen. 11 is a big number. One can rationalized 3 or 2 but 11. It is problematic.

That's heavy, dude. 'Cause like, if you just have maybe 2 or 3 unqualified, incompetent people who think they had a supernatural experience that's inconsistent with objective reality, then you could maybe rationalize that away. But when you've got 2 or 3 unqualified, incompetent people who each had a vested interest in the public buying copies of the Book of Mormon, and they say they had a supernatural experience that's inconsistent with objective reality, and then you add to that 8 of Joseph Smith's close friends and immediate family who saw an object they could not possibly have authenticated.....why, then that's problematic. That's much harder to just rationalize away.

And I think that's why the Lord followed this particular modus operandi. You can just dismiss a little bit of BS, but when there's a whole bunch of BS, it's much more problematic.

[_Drifting]

There was reason why 11 were chosen. 11 is a big number. One can rationalized 3 or 2 but 11. It is problematic.

That's heavy, dude. 'Cause like, if you just have maybe 2 or 3 unqualified, incompetent people who think they had a supernatural experience that's inconsistent with objective reality, then you could maybe rationalize that away. But when you've got 2 or 3 unqualified, incompetent people who each had a vested interest in the public buying copies of the Book of Mormon, and they say they had a supernatural experience that's inconsistent with objective reality, and then you add to that 8 of Joseph Smith's close friends and immediate family who saw an object they could not possibly have authenticated.....why, then that's problematic. That's much harder to just rationalize away.

And I think that's why the Lord followed this particular modus operandi. You can just dismiss a little bit of b***s***, but when there's a whole bunch of b***s***, it's much more problematic.

What shame they couldn't find a twelfth...