In faith crisis lingo, these items on your shelf come about when you are studying the gospel and you come across a principle or a piece of history that doesn't quite make sense to you. Rather than seeing that thing as evidence against your current religious worldview, you just assume there is a good answer to it out there somewhere and you put it on "the shelf". Once it's there, you can move on, ignore it for a while. Every once in a while you might pull it down off the shelf and glance at it, just to see if you have found any answers relating to it. If not, you just put it back. This can happen multiple times over a lifetime, coming upon troubling issues, not having an answer, putting it on the shelf. Eventually, the shelf is so full, so weighed down with unanswered questions, that it can break.
Over a lifetime of church membership, I shelved a number of items. I didn't realize that's what I was doing until much later, but I absolutely was. In this post, I will list the items I placed on my shelf, about when I placed them there, and how I dealt with them at the time. Looking back, it is difficult to see how I could dismiss these things, how I could ignore them, but I have to remind myself that dealing with them would mean asking myself questions that I wasn't ready to answer. It would mean having to make a choice that I wasn't ready to make. It was so much easier to ignore them and pretend there was no issue.
The Golden Plates
One of the first things that struck me as odd was the golden plates. Or, rather, the lack of them. I was taught that they contained a record of the people that inhabited this continent and they were buried in a hill, only to be found by Joseph Smith centuries later. He translated them and voila, we have the Book of Mormon. I remember being fascinated by the golden plates. One of the paperback Book of Mormons when I was a kid was made to look like the plates, and it was my favorite to use at church or for Family Home Evening. So shiny.
When I was about 9 years old, we made the trip to Salt Lake City to have Tony sealed to us and we toured the Visitors Center and the museums while we were there. There were all sorts of artifacts and things to look at behind glass cases. I loved this stuff. I was so excited to see the golden plates. Surely, if they were anywhere, they would be here. I asked my parents where they were. I was told that no one knew where they were, that God had taken them back after Joseph was done with them. I was so disappointed. Disappointment slowly turned into suspicion. You mean to tell me that no one has these plates? They are nowhere? How do we even know they existed? How do we know they are real? My parents assured me that they were real, and that if we had them now to look at and touch, then we wouldn't need to have any faith. That's why God took them back - because we needed to have faith. I was nine. I believed them. I let that one go. However, it would resurface every time we had a lesson on the translation of the golden plates. I relied heavily on the testimony of the three witnesses, who said they saw the plates themselves. Of course, this is before I learned that they saw them with their 'spiritual eyes'. I relied on Emma's account of touching the pages of the plates while they were under a cloth on the table. That was before I knew Emma to have a selective and faithful memory when it came to talking about Joseph and that the church only relied on her testimony when it fit the narrative.
Polygamy
As a woman in the church, this item probably weighed the most on my shelf. I can't remember how old I was when I first learned that polygamy was practiced in the early days of the church. I am going to guess that I was a teenager, maybe 13 or 14. My understanding, at the time, was that Brigham Young was the first prophet to institute polygamy, a necessity after the Saints crossed the plains into Utah and lost so many men in the process. There were just too many widows to take care of. So the good men of Utah married these women to care for them. I am pretty sure this was the way my mind made it all work until I was about 43 years old. Thirty years of mental gymnastics, never really wanting to learn more for fear of what I would learn and subsequently have to face.
At 43 years of age, I started reading. I first became aware of the number of Joseph's wives, not Brigham's, when I read the CES letter. I had expressed some doubts I was having to a friend that I knew had left a few years before, and he encouraged me to read the CES letter, "one Latter-day Saint's honest quest to get official answers from the LDS Church on its troubling origins, history and practices". It told me that Joseph had over 30 wives, and that some of them were as young as 14. It also told me that he not only married multiple women, but he married OTHER men's wives. What?! Well, then I needed to know more. I read the very faithful "Rough Stone Rolling" by Richard Bushman. Sold in Deseret Book. I felt guilty reading it, because it was a biography of Joseph Smith, and for some reason, it felt wrong to want to know more about his life. I recall learning of his sham marriage to the Partridge sisters, which he performed for Emma's sake after lying to Emma about his multiple marriages - including to the Partridge sisters, to whom he was already married! I was sitting in bed when I read that part. I got immediately upset. Dave was there. He asked me what was wrong. And I let loose. I raged over what I had just learned. I'm not sure what Dave thought of that tirade, but the truth I was learning was helping me to find my voice, and that felt good. Then I read "Mormon Enigma", a biography of Emma. In it I learned details of how Joseph hid his marriages and the principle of plural marriage from Emma. I learned that she was like the 21st wife he had sealed to her, not the first. He lied. There is no other way to say it. He purposefully and willingly deceived his "dear and beloved companion", Emma.
All my life, for as long as I could remember, I was taught to revere Joseph Smith. After learning these indisputable facts about how he lived and how he used his authority and power to manipulate others and to coerce women into plural marriage, thirty years of reverence for this man came crashing down. I remember driving home from work one day, going East on Highway 14, and looking up at Mt Hood, covered in snow and thinking, "What if he wasn't a prophet at all?" I think I said it out loud. I couldn't believe those words had escaped my lips. I cried. What did that mean, if it were true? What did that mean for my life? What did it mean for my marriage? For my relationships? It was a terrifying question to ask myself.
Faithful members would tell me not to worry so much about a principle that is no longer practiced. But here's the thing. Men in the church can be sealed to more than one woman, thereby having multiple wives when they enter the celestial kingdom. The D&C tells us that a man must have more than one wife to attain the highest degree of glory. Brigham Young stated "the only men who become Gods, even the sons of God, are those who enter into polygamy". Polygamy is absolutely still a part of the doctrine and of the church. It is amazing to me how faithful members can defend the practice in the early history of the church, and snub their nose at the notion of it being practiced today. Yet it is. And it harms, even today. Just read "The Ghost of Eternal Polygamy" to see how it is affecting women even today.
I have also read enough books now to know how plural marriage worked back in the 19th century among the saints. I have read quotes from the men at the helm. I have read journal entries and biographies of the women involved. If faithful members were to see that type of manipulation and coercion taking place today, between men and young women, they would be appalled. As a matter of fact, they ARE appalled to see it happening in the FLDS church, specifically under the leadership of Warren Jeffs. Here's the catch. If Joseph Smith or Brigham Young were to jump into a time machine and journey forward to our current day and age, and if they were to see the LDS church and the FLDS church side-by-side, which one do you think they would claim? They would claim the FLDS as their own, because it most closely resembles the principles they both taught.
Polygamy harms. There is no other way to say it. It harms women. On a deep and fundamental level.
Priesthood/Temple Ban
Another troubling aspect of church history that I was not aware of until I was probably 14 years old. I guess they didn't like to talk about polygamy and racism in Primary. It never came up, I promise you that. However, when you start attending seminary and they cover the D&C, it's hard to hide some of the ugly underbelly of the church. I'm certain that is where I learned about the principle of plural marriage and the temple and priesthood ban for black people. I learned it in a group setting, among my teenage peers who were not likely to question the information being presented. I'm sure most of us learned it in a seminary class and looked around to see if anyone else thought it was strange, and when no one said anything, we figured everyone else already knew. There is that awful mantra again. "It must be me".
One of my best friends all through high school was black. AND she was a member of the church. We never really talked about it (par for course in the church - not talking about difficult things), but I always wondered how SHE reconciled the ban. My understanding of the policy at the time was that black men were not allowed to hold the priesthood until the late '70's. When I would ask my mom why, she would give a popular apologist response: "They weren't ready for it yet. Holding the priesthood is a big responsibility with big consequences and God was being kind by withholding it until they were ready." I'm not sure what I thought "ready" meant. But I accepted the answer. To my knowledge, my parents didn't have a racist bone in their bodies. If they did, it never showed. My dad was a hispanic kid that my very white mom fell in love with in 1964. When my mom told her mom that she had a boyfriend and his last name was Archuleta, my grandma said, "That doesn't sound American". It was frowned upon to date, let alone marry, a different culture. But my parents didn't care. And to have these two people, my moderately bi-racial parents, explain away what seemed like a terribly racist idea, I had to believe that they knew or understood something that I did not. Because I did not and do not believe that they ever felt like black people were "less than".
Anyway - this little gem of church history always bothered me. More than that, it embarrassed me. Try as I might, I could not rationalize the practice with myself, let alone with anyone that asked about it. When confronted with it, I would just get a pit in my stomach, which should have been a huge red flag to me. How often on my journey through the church did I ignore all the signals my body and soul were sending me? Too often.
Later, I came to understand that the ban was not only keeping black men from holding the priesthood, but it forbade entry into the temples by ANY black person. UNTIL 1978! No eternal marriages, no forever families, no salvation-ensuring covenants for black people. But do you think the church was okay accepting their tithes? Absolutely. Ironically, the ban seems to have begun with Brigham Young, not Joseph...not the prophet of the restoration, but his successor. Brigham stated that marrying a black person and mixing with their blood would result in immediate death. Later church leaders, when establishing LDS hospital in Salt Lake City, advocated for the segregation of donated blood, concerned that giving white members blood from black people might disqualify them from the priesthood. In 1943, the LDS Hospital opened a blood bank which kept separate blood stocks for whites and blacks. To say they believed and practiced what they preached would be an understatement.
But the policy did change. In 1978. Only later did I learn of the social and political pressures that were being put on the church to revise that doctrine. Spencer W Kimball lifted the ban and church leaders told members to ignore all they had ever learned and to embrace the new policy. I think many members left, feeling the leaders had been led astray by allowing black people the priesthood and temple blessings. Today, the church's official stance is they "don't know" why the ban was in place. There is no revelation. There is no doctrine in the scriptures. Just the racist ideas of the time. The church formally "disavows" all the previous teachings. Very convenient.
The Word of Wisdom
The Mormon health code. What was my understanding of it? Well, all the obvious things that people think of when they think of Mormonism. No coffee, no tea, no tobacco, no alcohol. All because Emma didn't like cleaning up tobacco after the men met for the School of the Prophets. Growing up, following this health code wasn't a big deal. Even as a teenager, I had little interest in smoking or drinking. I did try cigarettes once, out of peer pressure, but I was never brave enough to even inhale. I was never cool enough to be at parties where under-age drinking was taking place, so I never really had alcohol. I remember tasting it at someone's house while I was babysitting, but I thought it was nasty. So why would this item be on my shelf?
Well, as an adult, I became more familiar with the actual revelation, which includes a lot more than the aforementioned taboos. The Word of Wisdom, which is a revelation, also encourages healthy practices such as nutritious eating, the sparing use of meat, regular exercise, proper hygiene and sufficient rest. It actually allows for mild barley drinks, aka beer. But these guidelines were never emphasized. Meanwhile, I would sit and watch a morbidly obese woman stand and bear her testimony on the blessings of obeying the Word of Wisdom, and I could not help but wonder if she was eating meat sparingly. I don't mean to sound judgemental, but I saw the hypocrisy all over the place and that bothered me. It didn't help that I studied nutrition and worked as a Clinical Dietitian; I knew the merit of eating a nutritious diet and exercising regularly. Well, to make it all work, my self-righteousness kicked in with full force. I told myself that I understood the purpose of the revelation fully, and I was living it more fully than others. I was not only abstaining from the hot drinks, alcohol and tobacco, but I was eating nutritiously and exercising and taking care of my whole body. This was on my shelf, but only by a hair, because I was able to rationalize it away with self-righteous pride. Go me.
As I deconstructed Mormonism, I learned that not only was the Word of Wisdom issued "not by commandment or constraint", but it wasn't even followed by the men that issued it. Joseph was known to drink wine, beer, tea and to use tobacco. He operated a tavern for a short time in Far West and allowed Porter Rockwell to operate a bar out of the Nauvoo Mansion for a short time. Brigham Young allowed tobacco in the Salt Lake Tabernacle until 1870, and operated a bar in the area for visitors to frequent. I was on an airplane, reading, when I learned that Joseph regularly partook. That's how memorable the moment was - I remember exactly where I was when I learned that truth, and it shook me.
Obeying the Word of Wisdom is a requirement for baptism, for a temple recommend (and thus for temple marriage), for missionary service, and for holding most callings in the church. It's no small thing. Talks have been given in General Conference about the pitfalls of simply drinking coffee and how it can lead to generations of unfaithfulness in a family. Yet, so much allowance is given for energy drinks and Mt Dew and overeating. It's the double standard that gets me. Joseph, who was the one to receive the revelation, drank wine in Carthage Jail, just prior to his death! Yet, we are shaming people who drink coffee?
Dave and I have both been drinking coffee for the past 3-4 years. In the last year, we have started trying alcoholic drinks. There are only a few I can tolerate, Dave is more open to stronger drinks. We have found it lightens our moods, namely when out socializing with others. We have never had 'too much to drink', not once. And we have no intention to. We are both fully aware of the dangers of alcohol and we have the appropriate amount of respect for that.
Dave and I sharing a 'flight' of ciders at the Gorge White House, 2022
Signs & Tokens
Another heavy shelf item. Those damn handshakes in the temple. Actually, the entire endowment ceremony. I shelved this one fast and furiously, and I did not take it down to examine it - because it made me so uncomfortable. I never sought greater understanding here. I think I knew it could not be had; no explanation would have made this temple ritual comfortable for me. So, I just avoided going. That's how I dealt with it. I remember a 'Temple Date Night' being arranged among some acquaintances at church. I was working that day and I intentionally worked late so that I would miss the session and just meet everyone for dinner afterward. I went to great lengths. I can honestly say that going to the temple was never my idea. Nevertheless, it was such an integral part of the religion that I prescribed to - a religion that in every other way, I adhered to. I guess that's where the shelf comes in handy.
I later came to learn, only after losing my faith, that the signs and tokens and much of the endowment ceremony was not unique to Mormonism at all. But that is a story for another post...
Patriarchy & Sexism
Growing up Mormon AND with a Hispanic dad, patriarchy was second nature to me. It was reinforced on all sides. My dad never threw his manhood around, but culturally, he was the provider and decision maker in our home - before he was ever the priesthood holder and religious patriarch. He was very traditional. He didn't let my mom pump gas, that was a man's job. He never told my mom how much money he made. He did the taxes and paid all the bills. He made the decisions for the family. Once we joined the church, the role of patriarch just fell into place so naturally. I recognize that my lived experience with my dad may be different than that of my other siblings. I can only speak for myself. But I would have to say that in my dealings with my dad as my patriarch, he governed with love. The role did not go to his head, but rather he felt an honest and sincere obligation to preside over and protect his family.
Naturally, when I got married, I expected the roles to remain the same, with a few important exceptions...I did know what our finances were and I was absolutely able to pump my own gas. But I let Dave lead. That's what I knew. It's what I was comfortable with, honestly. And like my dad, he led with love.
So when did it become a shelf item? I would say the only time I struggled with the notion of being 'presided over' was when it came to some of my personal choices. For instance, as I mentioned in previous posts, the wearing of garments. What a personal choice my underwear was! ... yet it wasn't. My husband had the right to police how and when I wore them. My (male) church leaders were allowed to straight-up ASK me if I was wearing them. My underwear! At one point in our illustrious Mormon career, Dave was extended a calling that prompted him to 'come clean' with the bishop. This, by default, necessitated that I also 'come clean' so that Dave could worthily serve. I was simply told that I was meeting with the bishop to set things right from our past. No one asked me, no one invited me to do it. I was told where to go and I showed up and bore my soul to another man about sexual transgressions in my distant past so that my husband could serve in the church. I can remember getting pretty irritated when, in a family tithing settlement - in front of all my kids, the bishop expressed great concern over the fact that I was working on Sundays. I was essentially chastised. At the time, I was covering the ICU one weekend a month at the hospital. I remember thinking, "What if YOU were in the ICU that day, Bishop? Wouldn't you want people there to take care of you?" And I wondered if it would have even been an issue had it been Dave working in the ICU on a Sunday. My work schedule was certainly never an issue when Dave was in dental school and I was working to support us. In addition, Dave and I had a number of arguments that involved me voicing my opinion on how to deal with a child or a big financial decision. I struggled to use my voice, and when I did use it, I felt like I was doing something wrong. I was pushing back, all the while knowing that I really wasn't supposed to. After all, in the temple, I had covenanted to 'hearken to my husband as he hearkens to the counsel of the Father'. And Dave was a good LDS man, so why was I not 'hearkening'? These are small things, a trifle, especially compared to some of the abuse that many women endure in the name of obedience and righteous dominion. But they troubled me; they made me feel like a child sometimes, rather than a wife.
Gay Marriage
It will come as no surprise that the church is opposed to gay marriage. Despite what you hear in the news these days, they are unequivocally opposed to it. Dallin Oaks recently reaffirmed the church's stance of "Church doctrine approving only marriage between one man and one woman". The organization itself is careful to support legislation that may look affirming, but the main concern is preserving religious liberties. It's a long, sordid story. The main take-away is that in my time in the church, the stance was not muddled at all. Queer people were not really welcome.
Growing up in the '80s and '90s, there was already a stigma when it came to queerness. The AIDS epidemic further exacerbated that, labeling gay people as promiscuous and careless. It wasn't unheard of to have the devastating and deadly disease labeled a 'divine punishment'. The word 'gay' was used to describe anything that was not cool or stupid. This was universal, not associated with any religion, but certainly not refuted by any.
In my home, we didn't talk about homosexuality. I had a gay uncle, my whole life, and no one ever told me. I think I was 17-years old when my older brother finally let me in on the secret. It didn't change my opinion of him; he had always been kind and funny. But I was able to piece together things...he lived with his 'best friend' for decades, he never married. But it never occurred to me that he was less than in any way. In high school, I knew a few openly gay students. Actually, maybe only one was out. Looking back, his courage to dress and behave how he felt represented who he was - astounds me. I'm sure he got picked on, but never by me or my friends. Not my female friends, anyway. I certainly had male friends - members of the church - who were not kind in the way they discussed gay people. Not kind at all.
All this to say that my exposure to gay people was almost nil. And a transgender individual? Not a chance. My very limited understanding of the church's stance on homosexuality was simply that it was "wrong"; it was not part of God's plan. I'm ashamed to say that I didn't think about it much beyond that. Not for a long time. When you grow up in the LDS church, your community is small and very LDS-centric. And as it turns out, there are not a lot of gay members of the church, and for a very good reason. Nevertheless, as an adult, gay marriage became a growing topic in the Mormon world, starting in 1994 or 1995, and remains so to this day. They issued the Family Proclamation, clarifying gender roles and emphasizing the church's current definition of marriage. Gay marriage was suddenly on ballots and in the legislature. The church wanted to 'protect families' by making sure it was never legal for gay people to marry. They asked voters in 2008, particularly in California (Prop 8), to join in their effort to protect families. Members were asked to give of their time and resources, by calling people and canvassing neighborhoods, and putting signs up in their yards to oppose equality in marriage. It was a big deal. My parents lived in California at the time, and I recall my mom talking about the things the ward members were being asked to do "in support of families". I remember being grateful that I was not living in California at the time; I would not have been comfortable participating. Not because I was this big LGBTQ ally, because I wasn't - but because I just didn't feel comfortable with it.
Ultimately, as we know, their overall efforts failed, and gay marriage is legal. But my personal journey with this issue changed in 2015. The church (quietly) instituted a policy that barred children living with same-sex couples from baby blessings and baptism AND declared members in gay marriages to be apostates, subject to excommunication. This was read over the pulpit in a letter from the First Presidency. I remember looking around for peoples' reactions, but there wasn't much to see. The feeling I got when I was processing this information on my own was akin to how I felt in the temple that first time; it felt uncomfortable. It didn't feel 'right'. It didn't feel divine.
My own son came out to us a couple of years later. Game changer. I wish it hadn't taken his coming out to open my eyes to the whole story. I had spent years knowing the policies of the church and dismissing them, because they did not directly affect me. I was the very definition of apathy and I have come to see how dangerous apathy can be. It literally kills people.
Having a gay child and being a member of the LDS church literally forced me to examine the doctrine and how it applied to my life. It did not take long to learn that it just doesn't work to be gay and be a Mormon. I don't care how you spin it, it DOES NOT WORK. The more I stirred the pot of doctrine and policy, the more shit floated to the surface.
The church's relationship with the LGBTQ community is long and complicated and ugly. Conversion shock therapy at BYU, gay married couples excommunicated, Spencer W Kimball's "The Miracle of Forgiveness", BYU students kicked out of school for being gay, gay BYU students actually TOLD by the president of the school to leave the school lest they 'contaminate' others. The list goes on and there are entire presentations and papers detailing the atrocities against the queer community. This is one of the most complete and thorough ones I have encountered:
I don't have the time or the energy to detail all the ugliness here. Suffice it to say, the church preaches love and acceptance from the pulpit - but practices exclusion and discrimination in it's actions. As my mom always said, "Actions speak louder than words". Damn right, Mom.
This was possibly the one shelf item that caused my shelf to finally break. When it broke, I finally started taking the time to look at all the mess around my feet and instead of picking everything up and placing it back on that shelf, I sat with it, which was probably the worst thing I could have done for my testimony and the best thing I have ever done for my soul.
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