It’s been decades since I left Salt Lake City Ut. Even though I was born and raised in the LDS mecca, I knew I would never settle there. I came home on college breaks to visit family in the late ’80s, but I always made sure those visits weren’t longer than a few weeks. Growing up as a non-Mormon (“Nons” as my Dad would jokingly call us) was enough exposure to the Mormon culture for a lifetime.
I never expected something like the internet to change how I saw the Mormon people and their life journeys. I never expected that all that stalwart honesty and sincere devotion to the simple (if often questionable) “truths” of the LDS church could be turned inward as people left the church for innumerable reasons. The authenticity of your struggles has been inspiring and humbling, even to someone like me who grew up in the shadow of the church.
And boy are you talking about it. Year after year new voices join the waves of ex-Mormons seeking truth and a new life outside the church. Something pops up on my feed almost daily, detailing struggles and the profound choices you’re facing. If only viewed through the lens of the internet, the population of ex-Mormons is definitely growing faster than Mormonism itself.
The internet probably has more than a little to do with this apparently growing phenomena. The axiom of our times might be: if it doesn’t…
