published on
tags: lds

Exclusion Policy

A year ago today.

That’s when the LDS church’s Exclusion Policy was leaked. That’s when they set fire to the splintered halfs of my proverbial shelf.

Mine started as a fairly orthodox faith/belief/involvement in the Mormon tradition. I inherited the religion from my parents. I was baptised as a child, participated in every weekly activity, attended seminary, attended BYU for both of my degrees, went on mission, I consistently paid tithing, and honestly answered all temple recommend questions honestly every time I was asked (fond memories the time I answered “does it still count as sustaining the prophet if I think it’s wrong for us to build a mall with sacred funds?“).

Just the other day I found the set of scriptures I used on my mission; the set into which I copied the notes and quotes I had originally learned and with which I filled my original set of seminary scriptures. I took 14+ credits of religious, generally Mormon-centric college courses. I know there are those who would judge otherwise, but I feel like I honestly tried.

Often erring on the spirit-of-the-law side of adherence and obedience mine eventually evolved into a more liberal, inclusive hippie-Jesus version of the Mormon faith tradition. Eventually I discovered that “anti-mormon lies” were just history, and that discovery led me on a journey through the more exciting parts of church history. Startling discover after another eventually shattered what was left of my beliefs in a Mormon-flavored version of the divine.

So there it was in a dry pile in the corner of my mind: my proverbial shelf sat shattered and unattended. The spark of the news that children were being targeted for the so-called “sins” of their parents ignited that shelf and evaporated the relevance of the Mormon church from my life. I officially resigned within a few days.

I used to look forward to the fifth of November. Now I have a different set of reasons this day will never be forgot.