Where Am I Now?

Since starting this blog a few months ago--has it really been that long already?--I have written quite a bit about the period of time from my brother's passing to when I started attending sacrament meeting. I wrote about my first couple meetings with the bishop but then kind of stopped. I don't think I even wrote about my last meeting with the bishop. I feel like I should do a sort of catch-up post just to let you know where I am now in my process and what kinds of things I've been processing the past month and a half or so.

**Small update: I'm glad I'm publishing this post now because the bishop asked me last night if we could meet "just to see how I'm doing" this Sunday. There may be more developments forthcoming.**


At my last meeting with the bishop (the third), I told him about the dream I had, the one in which my head was being crushed by that machine and I knew I was going to die. In the dream, I knew I was willingly allowing myself to be killed, sacrificing myself, if you will. I related the dream to the story of Abraham in the Bible, the one in which he is asked to sacrifice his son. As he raises the knife over his son's body, an angel stops him and says he has proven his faith in God (or something like that) and his son is then spared. In the dream, after the machine pressed on my head and I knew I was going to die, I felt peace in doing that. Like Abraham's son, I was also spared, and I woke up repeating, I'm alive! I'm alive! in my head.

The bishop, who apparently is big into Hebrew symbology, talked about symbols of heaven that were present in my dream and seemed almost to think that the dream was somewhat prophetic in some way. As he talked, he kept mentioning sacrifice and our need to sacrifice things in life. He was under the impression that if I made sacrifices for the Lord, I would receive great blessings that would be beyond my mortal imagining in the afterlife. He then talked about the things that he has had to sacrifice in his own life, things that he felt were integral parts of his personality. This started to make me wonder. I finally asked, "You may not even be able to answer this directly, but when you talk about sacrifice, are you referring to my sexuality?" His answer was circuitous. But the essence was that the answer was between me and God and I should seek out anything in life that will ultimately bring me closer to Him. He encouraged me to think about what I "really" want out of this life and what will "really" bring me "true" happiness (i.e. a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ). He promised me that any sacrifices I made for Him would be worth it. (And this is what he connected to my hearing in my head the phrase, "I never said it would be easy. I only said it would be worth it.")

He missed the mark.

Abraham didn't have to actually kill his son. He only had to show that he was willing to do so.

I didn't actually die in my my dream. I only showed that I was willing and ready to do so.

The bishop's interpretation of my dream to mean that I needed to sacrifice the one thing I feel like I want most out of this life, a companion, in order to have blessings in the next life does not align with either my dream or the Bible story I compared it to. Also, the "still small voice" I heard in my head that said, "I never said it would be easy. I only said it would be worth it" came as I was thinking about how miserable I had been for the past 18+ years. It did not come while contemplating giving up my sexuality, which is the only logical thing to be thinking about if the bishop's interpretation were to be accurate. When I heard, "All that you've wanted, you will have," I was thinking about the kind of life that would make all my suffering "worth it." I was picturing sitting on a porch, holding my husband's hand, watching our children play in the yard. I was picturing a life of love and companionship with a man when I had the distinct impression that I would have all I have wanted. The bishop's interpretation that this "message" was in reference to the next life could not possibly be accurate, given what I was thinking about when I had the feeling.

It was immediately after that meeting that I decided I was done meeting with him in that capacity. It would be impossible for him to see things the way I did. And even if he did, his position in the church would preclude him from vocalizing it. He is under an obligation to uphold the current interpretations of the scriptures. That interpretation means nothing to me, as I see it as fundamentally flawed and mistranslated and taken out of context.

Since then, I have had the bishop and his family over to my house for dinner and games. I jumped in the frozen lake with them on Christmas day and went to their house afterward for hot chocolate. I went to his house last night for dinner. He calls me "friend" when he sends me text messages. I think that is the relationship we need to have. The bishop-ward member relationship we had in our meetings could not have gone anywhere because I am not able to do the things he wants me to, believe the way he does, or think the way he does. (And frankly, it hurt my feelings in a way I am unable to describe to literally pour my heart out to him about how I see my sexuality, how much I have struggled, and how badly I want love and companionship in this life only to have him tell me that only a relationship with Christ is true happiness and that everything else can be sacrificed for that.) I see the LDS church and religion and faith very differently than he does. He will never change. Nor will I.

* * *

I feel like some of my family members and friends got very excited when they heard I was attending church again. I have received messages applauding my "first steps" back in to the church, implying that I was in a process that would ultimately end with my full active, faithful membership. This, I am sorry to say, will never happen. Others were scratching their heads, baffled that I would ever set foot in a church again after being so vocal about my pragmatic, humanist beliefs. They perhaps believed that I had no sense of or belief in any kind of spirituality. This also is not the case.

I have always been a critical thinker. I have always asked "Why?" and "How?" These questions have led me to discover things about the LDS church that I will never be able to overlook or accept. Aside from details about this particular church (and accepting that all religions have their skeletons in the closet), there are too many other metaphysical things that I am unable to accept, concepts like eternity and Satan and omnipotence and asking God to bless our food before we eat it, for example.

So why am I attending sacrament meeting every Sunday then? Why would a non-religious person feel such a strong desire to go to church each week? That is more difficult to answer effectively. I like the quietude and time to ponder and listen and feel. I like the sense of community. I like the tidbits I can take from people's talks and apply to my own life somehow. I love singing the hymns. I love leaving my phone at home, leaving everything behind, and existing, for that short 90 minutes or so, apart from the busy, loud world. What Mormons call "The Spirit," I call "Inner Peace," and I feel it often whether at church or not. What Mormons call "prayer," I call "pondering," and it too, I do often. What Mormons call "Heavenly Father," I call "The Universe," and I try to feel as connected as I can to it. Juliet has it exactly right when she says, "What's in a name? that which we call a rose / by any other name would smell as sweet" (II.ii.47-48).

Seeing many of the reactions to recent happenings, like marriage equality in Utah, has only served to bolster my positions about scripture--see upcoming On the Box post--and faith and religion. Ignorance is rampant. Bigotry is rampant. Self-righteousness is rampant. The articles I've read by some devout Mormons that speak out against marriage equality have saddened me greatly. The rallies in Utah that call for "an uprising" disgust me. Every time I hear about the "attack" on traditional marriage I want to scream. I know that change comes slowly, but good grief...

There is, however, also a huge outpouring of love and support from enlightened people within the LDS church. There are organizations and individuals who are putting themselves on the line for full equality. These people fill me with such hope and love and gratitude. It is these people who make me want to continue going to church, who make me want to make my own voice be heard, and who make me want to help others who have been or currently are where I have been.