family relations

With my family, the bastion of TBM-ness, there has been relatively little conversation with me about religion since I announced my move away from the Mormon church. There has been absolutely no interest in the reasons of why I left (to cite two of countless examples: Book of Mormon as 19th century literature; "therapies" used on homosexual men). From what I can tell, they see it as an intellectual pridefulness and youthful ignorance that did me in. From my parents' perspective, I'm going through a phase, a I-need-to-experience-life-for-myself thing, tinged with rebelliousness. But, according to them, I am ultimately led by Heavenly Father in a way that I can't see but they can, and this time away from the church is but a teaching moment in God's wider plan for me. While I'm not comfortable with this interpretation, it is, I think, the best I can hope for right now.

The treatment I get from them as a result of their thinking on the matter urges me to just let them have their interpretation: they let me be, don't chastise me for what they see as my sins, and see me as a happy and good person, still ultimately on a path toward salvation, rather than destruction. Bit by bit, details of my experience of leaving (as opposed to the reasons for my leaving) have come out to a couple of them. The rest never bring it up, so I don't either.

I've adopted a similar policy with my parents-in-law. If they bring it up first, I'll bring it up. They don't. (The initial "announcement" of our unbelief to our two families was entirely different; I'll put that in another post.)

But I've developed a different approach with my husband's siblings and their spouses. All of them are either Jack Mormon or once were Jack and are now liberal. The way I'm using Jack Mormon is this: They believe The Church is True, but aren't too hedged in by restrictions like the Word of Wisdom, don't feel the compulsion to attend church weekly, and would clean up their act (pay tithing, attend regularly, stop drinking) long enough to get married in the temple. This is probably because they also feel some level of guilt about their non-orthopraxy; give the Brethren authority over themselves (they would confess sexual sins to the bishop, and give him power to decide whether or not the priesthood holder is worthy enough to bless their baby) and still see themselves as fundamentally LDS.

Because they are like this, they have accepted us in a different way than my family has. They are non-judgmental about us drinking alcohol, for example, and one has even consented to be our designated driver on a couple occasions. Because of their openness, I have talked to them more openly about my experience. For example, I may vent a little about how no one in my family will talk to me, or I may be freer to mention that the friends I just had dinner with were fellow ex-Mormons. In turn, they are more willing to vent to us, or to reveal their dirty little secrets from their wild days, past or current.

With them, I feel more comfortable and accepted as me. The current version of me. With my family, I feel like I've perhaps re-adopted something more of a past version of me, and I put that fta-as-TBM-mask on when I'm with them. It's hard to explain what I mean. It's like I go back in the unbeliever's closet around them. But they know I'm an unbeliever, so perhaps the door is glass. They see me, I'm not really hiding, but I am still restricted by the small confines of the closet.

I saw members of both of our families while I visited Utah for the holidays. I felt both comfortable and uncomfortable with both families. I'll explain more in other posts.