Mormon Encounters: Part 3 - Going to the Mormon Church

Entire Mormon Encounters series: 
Part 1: First meeting       Aside 1, Aside 2 

Part 2: Reading the Book of Mormon 

Part 4: Mormon Battalion & General Conference
Part 5: The Missionary Sisters
Part 6: A Talk Among Friends
Part 7: Adam & Free Agency
Part 8: To the Investigators
Part 9: To the Missionaries

Well, having missed the first invitation to the Mormon (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints AKA LDS) church I made good on my second chance, invading one of their San Diego area wards with my new Mormon friends (sans the Garanca-look-alike one, it seems she is a sister trainer and was just visiting for the day when they last came round). As you can see, even a hard-headed 'atheist' like me isn't above agreeing to go to church when accompanied by cute and highly attentive lasses!

Apparently my two missionaries weren't allowed to, among many other things, give me a ride, so they arranged for a regular Mormon girl who lived nearby to chauffeur me to their church functions instead. As it turned out, my ride was in the process of preparing to leave town for a missionary stint of her own... in one of my former Midwestern hometowns!

The building isn't all that remarkable looking from the outside. Walking into the sparsely decorated interior, however, I was surrounded by the very conservatively dressed crowd of extremely friendly people who zoomed right over for a hug and a chat. I suspect that that was meant to be a warm welcome, but it had the effect of making me feel like an escapee from the petting zoo. It was nice if vaguely creepy in a smothering sort of way.

The sacrament meeting, as the Mormons call their Sunday church service, took place in the church sanctuary, and it is quite different from what you'd experience at a Christian church. First off, instead of everyone sitting in the same area facing the same way toward a preacher on the podium at one end of the room, there are actually 2 seating sections. On the stage seats facing the rest of the congregation from behind the podium sat rather stern looking church leaders who spent much of their time scanning the audience from their perches.

The 'sacrament meeting' began with the singing of hymns (they seem to always sing every verses instead of just picking one or two, so each hymn went on for a while). Everybody dutifully sang (I didn't, though. I'm not a Mormon even though everybody there seem to assume that I am or will shortly be). Some, like my driver/escort (I think I'll call her Sister-to-be Harriet), sang quite beautifully, though a definite zest is missing from it all. I've never felt any urge to attend any Christian church after turning away from that religion sometime in 1999-2000, but I remember that at least the singing there usually was quite spirited. Here, it just sounded.... confined and controlled (heck, they even have a resident chorus master conducting every hymn from her stage seat). 

Spontaneity was tacitly checked at the sanctuary doors, apparently. Nobody aside from the little kids made any noise in between the musical numbers and even during and between the testimonies aside from some hushed 'Amen' after a prayer. (They don't have a trained clergy to give Sunday sermons like the Christians do, instead the pre-selected church members seated in the front row of the stage took turn giving their 'testimonies' AKA speeches at the podium). A testimony isn't quite the same as a sermon, but rather a personal talk about one's experience as a Mormon.... and sometimes just an elaborate announcement that one's either about to be sent on a mission or had just returned from one. I always feel a bit claustrophobic after a bit in this sort of setting. Such a packed house and often emotional series of speeches that produced no banter or audience reaction whatsoever. It felt as if the whole place was under an omerta one doesn't dare break because one is always conscious of being visible to the church leaders.

The sanctuary of the Mormon church I visited after the October 2011 Stake Conference. Have a look at the lady in black's scripture books! The Mormons regard as holy scriptures the KJ Bible (annotated by Joseph Smith), the Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and The Pearl of Great Price.

Having been to this church 3 times now I'm seeing a strange pattern with all these testimonies. The speakers seem to do just fine during the meat of their fervent talk. Some take a few minutes longer to get comfortable, but they all looked and sounded comfortable enough after a while, then they would get to the closing with the very formulaic 'it is my testimony that this is the true church, that Jesus is the savior and that Joseph Smith was a prophet, and I say all these things in Jesus' name. Amen,' and many of them could hardly get through it without breaking down. I'm not sure what so shook them up about having to recite that ending; because they were emotionally overwhelmed in a good way or because they didn't truly believe everything in that formulaic closing themselves and were shaken by their own subconscious recognition of the spiritual dishonesty in the act of professing to believe what one doesn't actually believe. Whatever it is, it makes for an odd pattern for the outsider me.

But why would I even suspect that those good people may not actually believe what they profess about the truth of their church or their founding prophet? I would freely confess that I can occasionally (especially when in a religious setting) be a bit paranoid, but from all the time I've been spending with my nice missionaries and their more normal Mormon numbers it is becoming clearer and clearer to me that the LDS dogma is much more enthusiastic about rites and rituals than it is about people's spirituality and integrity.

Everything is choreographed and ritualistic. When they visit, the sisters pray before their meal, before beginning the 'discussion', and after it. Churchgoers take sacrament/communion every Sunday, and the procedure is as choreographed as those you'd see in the rites-loving Catholic services. There's something idolistic about their notion of priesthood and their exclusive ability to perform soul-saving  procedures like baptism or temple sealing or endowment (naturally, they don't seem to regard Christian priests or clergies as having valid office). There's a strict dress code for church members (and even stricter one for missionaries), and even a dietary code. I already mentioned how everyone ends his/her testimony with the same closing formula. Heck, even the podium height is choreographed to match each speaker! It seems like a lot of emphasis is placed on appearance and not enough on what the person feels inside.

Robot by Felipe Micaroni Lalli & Odder

But on a more serious note, the biggest turn off I'm getting from my contacts with the nice Mormon folks is in what is preached in successive testimonies from church leaders and in what my otherwise-quite-nice missionaries are trying to drum into me: obedience is the greatest of virtues (and there is no use in asking, 'Obedience to what???' They just don't answer that question); the prophets/church leaders speak for god; god/prophet would never lead us astray (though the missionaries will know nothing about when LDS prophets actually did lead the Mormons astray: Kirkland Banking Society, United Order communism, polygamy, the Kinderhook plates fiasco, falling for Mark Hoffmann's forged documents, etc); we must build more temples so that people can be blessed (you can't get to the highest level of heaven and be with your 'forever family' if you haven't gone through certain rituals - sealing and temple marriage - that can only take place in a temple) so we must all work harder on our church callings and proselytize more to the gentiles and pay full tithe (10% of your gross personal income) to fund temple building; it doesn't matter if I don't believe in Elohim or Jehovah or the divinity of Jesus - I should just keep saying prayers to the Heavenly Father in the name of Jesus and all this repetitive 'work' will lead me to faith in the end. After all, 'a testimony is to be found in the bearing of it' (how's that for personal integrity, ay? They're basically advocating lying to investigators in the hope of convincing themselves. If there is a god, I doubt that it is so morally corrupted that it would approve of such tactic).

                                                         

As dodgy as all of them are, the last one really quite bugs me. The sisters successful coerced me into saying a prayer last week after I made the mistake of offering one of them a CD of operatic prayers for her birthday. She read me as a softie that I am and pleaded for a prayer as a special birthday treat... A stronger person than me would have resisted, but the lass was a 1,000 miles away from home on her birthday and she looks exactly like Elina Garanca... (well, perhaps not in this exact same sort of props), so after much grumbling I said a short grace wishing them safety and lots of interesting experiences on their mission. It perked them right up about as much as it filled me with shame. I meant every bit of the well-wishing part, but the formulaic parts (Heavenly Father .... in Jesus' name) that sandwiched it was completely bogus. 

"I do not mean by this declaration to condemn those who believe otherwise; they have the same right to their belief as I have to mine. But it is necessary to the happiness of man, that he be mentally faithful to himself. Infidelity does not consist in believing, or in disbelieving; it consists in professing to believe what he does not believe."
 - Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason

They tried to get me to say a prayer again yesterday after the Stake Conference. I said no and told them that the honest way of going about such thing is for me to first believe in their god and the divinity of Jesus, etc, and then pray as an expression of my belief rather than to mouth off insincere prayers in the hope of gaining faith from the sheer repetition of it. The former is intellectually and spiritually honest, the latter is none of the above. I was very disappointed in the lasses for making such a moral/ethic-corrupting demand on me no matter how well-intended they were, but I was more disappointed with myself for complying even once. Sometimes being kind isn't such a virtue... The good lasses deserved honesty rather than indulgence, I realize. But I'm curious to know, though, what would you have done?

What sort of church would pressure their missionaries to prioritize acquiring more tithe-paying labor-giving Mormons over showing investigators (those the missionaries try to convert) exactly what the LDS dogma is about so that they can make an informed decision about joining or not joining the church? I've ran into car dealerships that are more honest than the LDS organization!

Don't get me wrong, though, I really like these missionary sisters. I had been in a similar place to where they are now once, and I understand the many different things that can compel someone at their stage in life to hang desperately onto a religious dogma. It is a sort of experience that is priceless to have providing that one can escape from it before long. I'm very certain that these gals mean to do good for others, even though the methods they have been taught to use by their trusted church do grave disservices to their integrity. I hope they learn much from their missionary life and think their way out of the spiritual trap they are in once they realize the folly of judging things by emotion. (Perhaps emotion here is a wrong word by me... It's just that they often beseech me to use my heart rather than my head in judging the veracity of the Mormon scriptures. I mean the word here in that same sense).

Mormon Encounters Series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9.

Why I Don't Have A Religion