Why I'm not a Mormon!

Mormons and Why I'm Not one
Proudly Presented by Rich Barton


So this has been a long time in the making and I finally have the time tonight to sit down and write a few of my feelings on Mormonism and the cult/business that allows thieves and bigots to hide behind a facade of fluff, smoke, and mirrors.

It all started long before I was born, my great, great, great grandfather converted to Mormonism in England in the 1800's. In the years that followed his family made their trek to the US and eventually landed in Utah along with the other pioneers. They settled a small town north of Salt Lake City, subsequently, my great, great grandfather was the first bishop of the ward in that town. Fast forward to 1983, the year I was born (in the covenant as they would say) meaning I was born to parents that were married and sealed in an LDS temple. So right from the moment I was born Mormonism decided to sink its rotten teeth into my life. Several months later I was blessed as is customary and at the age of 8 not having the slightest clue about what I was getting myself into, I was baptized. The psychological games actually started several years before that. As a teenager in growing up I was surrounded by other church members. Growing up in the same small town founded by my forefathers and surrounded by about 99% Mormons I didn't know anything else. I had no idea how the rest of the world functioned or what they believed, I simply knew what I was told, and followed the rules. I do have some memories of breaking these rules..for example. When I was 13 and was called in for my annual interview with the bishop my guilt persuaded me to confess that I had in fact masturbated. We all know that this is not an uncommon thing for teenage boys to do, however, this bishop decided to inform me that "my eternal salvation was at stake", and sadly enough, I believed him for a while. Lets fast forward a little further (god maybe I should write a biography, I feel like I am skipping so much) I graduate from high school and go to college. I go to college for a year and have a wonderful LDS girlfriend, we try to behave ourselves and are brainwashed into believing that abstinence is worth it and that the goal of a temple marriage is valued beyond anything else. At first I decide I am not cut out to do the whole Mormon Missionary gig, I figured my time would and money would be better spent at college and actually making something that will be of value in my life for the future. I am coming up on 20 yrs old, my grandfather (who happened to be a stake president, and patriarch) counsels me and with great pressure from the family, friends, girlfriend, her family and what felt like the whole world, I decide to do the "right thing" and go on a mission. So I do the whole preparation thing and make sure I am "worthy", in fact, some old man...my stake president at the time decided to tell me I needed to wait 1yr before leaving since I had engaged in oral sex with my girlfriend, completely brainwashed and oblivious I decide that is what I must do. After months of spiritual and personal preparation I get my mission call. To Santiago Chile, I am excited. I always wanted to learn Spanish. A few months later I dropped off at the MTC (missionary training center) in Provo UT. Never before have I seen so many clueless fucking robots. I mean these kids were a million times worse than the worst holier than thou person I could imagine. Immediately I felt trapped. Had I made a wrong decision....Wait of course not! I was doing what the lord wanted right? I was taking one for the team and sacrificing 2 years of my life because it was for a "greater good". I just needed to hang in there and sweat it out. Besides, when I come home I would be a hero and make Mom and Dad, and everyone else so proud right? I had to follow through. So I did. More on the MTC. This has got to be one of the most focused, intense, well thought out brainwashing systems I have ever seen or been witness to. Rigid schedules. 10 hour class days consisting of religion and language and nothing else, and this lasts for 2 months. I couldn't believe it, this was hell. How did I let myself get in this deep? I did what I was told to do and prayed asking for strength or comfort to finish, because once again, this is what the Lord wanted me to do right?
I manage to survive the MTC and arrive in Santiago Chile, Jan 28, 2004. We meet the mission president (basically he acts as a parent/bishop over a certain area). I go to work, preaching and convincing and lying and deceiving. For the first 3 months things seemed to go ok, probably because I was simply in the process of adapting to my new environment/language and culture. This was a huge transition for an immature 20 yr old boy from small-town Utah, who had never traveled or lived on his own. Once the transition wore off and I became more accustomed to the culture/language and "work" which I was doing, then I started to become uneasy. I think it started when I was assigned to a real asshole companion. For those who don't know here is the cliff notes version on Mormon missionary companionships. Every missionary is assigned a companion. This is a person who you will live with, eat with, sleep in the same room with (not the same bed) and the person who you must keep with your sight and within a reasonable distance(varies depending on who tells you)in my case we were told about 20 ft, at all times. You have no idea who your companion will be, you are simply assigned a companion and you must leave and start your "work" with them immediately. Let me expound on just exactly how asinine this concept is. The only real privacy you are granted is in the bathroom at your private home, if you enter a public bathroom (for more than one person) your companion must accompany you to make sure you don't commit any sort of sin. This sounds ridiculous but it is %100 true. Sad to say, but the only solitude I had on my mission was taking a shit, how depressing is that? You can't listen to music, unless its church music, you can't watch TV. You have the same schedule everyday. Ours was blocked out into 15 min increments..all of which had to be filled with what we planned to do. Here is a quick rundown of the schedule. 6 am. Wake up, 12 min to get showered and ready including getting dressed. (eliminates possibility you have to masturbate while in the shower). The rest of the morning is assigned to study, personal study and companion study, where you plan out your day and talk about boring spiritual stuff. Then comes breakfast 1/2 an hour. Another hour of studying and then you have to be out of the apartment/house and start your preaching. So you basically walk around all day. Miles and miles of walking, and not your slow stroll either. They had these kids programmed to speed walk everywhere they went, I mean, we'd feel guilty if we were walking slow and wasting the lord's time right?
Day after day we did the same thing, talk to people everywhere we went and convince them to let us come into their home to tell them about Jesus and joseph smith and all the special things that would happen in their lives if they accepted both. It was during my time teaching these people in their homes that I seriously started questioning many core teachings that I had never before thought about. Here we were invited into someone's home and we are telling them in order to be a good person you must pay tithing, and quit smoking, or drinking and the list goes on and on. It was during these times, for example when I was trying to convince a dirt poor family who barely had enough money to buy food, that somehow if they paid their 10% tithing to the church that their lives would magically get better and they would be blessed. It was during these intense moments that I realized I was asking people to sacrifice when they had nothing left to give, and for what? I started realizing I did not believe many of the core teachings of the LDS faith, and subsequently felt like the biggest hypocrite in the world trying to convince others to change their lives and believe in something I did not believe at all..something I was simply told over and over and over as a child and simply took as common undisputable knowledge shared by all. My first qualms were with tithing. Is gods kingdom really a country club where to be saved and gain entry you must pay your monthly membership fees? Let's break down this process. The ultimate goal of the Mormon is to gain entry into the Celestial kingdom, this is the highest kingdom of heaven. However to gain entry to this kingdom one must do certain things, be baptized, males must hold priesthood, be sealed in the temple and have temple endowments. In order to retain satisfactory status in the church you must pay tithing, not use tobacco or alcohol, maintain sexual purity(including masturbation) and the list goes on and on. The point I am trying to get at is in even if you live your life according to all the other rules they have set forth, if you don't pay tithing you cannot attain the goal of celestial glory, how is this possible?? It is impossible to receive a temple recommend (club card which allows you to enter Mormon temples, given out by bishops and church leaders only after they have judged you as "worthy") if you do not pay your tithing, without a temple recommend you cannot be sealed in the temple and therefore have lost your chance at eternal life. Now maybe I am crazy but this sounds like a real fucking joke to me. And the part that killed me was me telling these people this is what they had to do. I soon began to ponder many other aspects of the religion. Looking for the answers to many unanswered questions. Why did the church support racism and prohibit blacks from receiving the priesthood if all men are created equal and in the image of God? Why did the church practice polygamy? A practice that gave dirty old bigots the power to indulge in young women and control them through their so called "priesthood authority". Too many questions to list came up about Joseph Smith. I'm not sure if there has ever been a more misleading, deceitful liar ever born on the earth. The lies he made up about revelations from God. The famous Book of Mormon which he supposedly received from an angel, and which ironically was given back to the angel after translation. Ha, you have got to be kidding me! It is a known fact that joseph smith was known by many as a treasure hunter and spent much of his time digging for buried treasure. Any coincidence that he would magically receive gold plates which contained the history of the ancient Americans? I don't think so. These wonderful tales came straight from the imaginative mind of a man...not from ancient Americans or god. The one thing joseph smith does deserve credit for is being creative, who else would come up with such a far fletched story and be able to convince so many of its validity. The master deceiver! I could go on forever about the life and lies of joseph smith, perhaps I should write a book on the subject, this would allow me to fully expose and expound upon the many lies, forgeries and crimes that constituted his life. Even in his death he has deceived many. Growing up in the church I heard over and over again the word martyr, how joseph had been so violently killed and went and i quote "as a lamb to the slaughter". This could never be farther from the truth. Joseph was jailed because he had destroyed a printing press from which a paper was printed which inquired into the subject of polygamy. What did he have to hide? Sounds like tactics used by organized crime rings to silence their opponents. At the time he was jailed he was also wanted by the United States for crimes of high treason. He was a criminal! A religious fanatic criminal! He did not die a martyr's death. He was armed with a smuggled pistol and shot back at his attackers reportedly killing several before he was killed. What martyr that goes "as a lamb to the slaughter" fires back? From what I've read Jesus didn't go about fighting back as he was being led to his death. And yet this same joseph smith is revered as a hero, a prophet, a martyr. How did the lies and crimes and corruption become so buried by the church? brigham young, josephs successor was equally if not more corrupt and his life contains enough lies for a completely separate article.
These were the questions that were haunting me as I sat in my apartment in Chile. I talked to the mission president about it, I told him I did not believe in the church and would like to return home and not waste any more of my time or money, he continually reassured me that with enough fasting and prayer god would tell me that I should not go home but that I should stay. Dozens of times over a six month period I told him the same thing...I did not believe in the teachings of the church and that I would like to return home. He decided to use psychological pressure to convince me to stay. Staging several conference calls with my parents back home in Utah, in which they pleaded with me to stay and how everything would work out fine and that they were so proud of me. Oh the guilt was unbearable. If I went home I would shame not only myself, buy my entire family. What was I to do? I was being held HOSTAGE by the church! One morning I woke up and decided enough was enough, I felt a moral obligation telling me that I could not keep lying and convincing people to change their lives and believe in something that I felt was wrong. So I wrote a note and stuck it to the apartment door and left that morning, alone. I basically went AWOL for a day. Not only was I seeking much needed serenity and alone time without an asshole companion peering over my shoulder, but I needed to get away. Since they would not let me leave the mission on my own terms I would use this as a way to have them send me home, as going missing for a day is not taken lightly. I enjoyed my day, visiting many beautiful parts of downtown Santiago Chile, indulging in some of the simplest pleasures in life, ones which I had been denied for the last year. Pleasures such as sitting on a park bench in the middle of the city and simply basking in the sunlight and people watching. It was so nice to be alone and simply relax. That day I went missing I felt the most liberating feeling I had ever felt. A high that lasted the entire day! I returned to my apartment that night and was immediately called by the mission president, he asked me if I would like to stay or go home! I laughed and asked how soon I could be home. Two days later I was on a plane home! I would miss Chile, the people, the culture, the beautiful country, I knew however, that I would not miss what I had been doing there for the last year. I returned home and tried to assimilate back into normalcy. A task which is much harder than it seems after a year straight of brainwashing and having spirituality force-fed down your throat every waking moment. I had disappointed my entire family and friends. Many very dear friends and family members refused to communicate with me after I came home. It was the friends who still showed love and support that really showed me what real friends are made of.
A year later I decided it was time to completely cut any ties with the church and to remove my name from the membership records. I found support in this decision from close friends and submitted the paperwork to have my name removed. This process ended up taking almost six months to complete and only after legal threats did they finally offer up proof that they had indeed removed my name from the records and cancelled my baptism, priesthood ordinations and temple endowments. Once again I felt liberated! I finally could feel closure in dealing with the church. I hoped I would never again be harassed or plagued by these things......I was sadly mistaken. When I asked for my name to be removed I explicitly stated that I did not want any member of my family to know, especially my mother and father as this would cause irreparable damage to my relationship with them. Approximately three months later I received a phone call from my father asking if he could stop by and talk to me on his way to work. I knew something big must have happened as this was not like him at all. I had no idea what he had to tell me. He stopped by and we chatted for a few minutes. He then asked if I had removed my name from the records and I told him that I had and immediately was curious as to how he came about this information. It just so happens that one of the members of the clergy from the ward where my parents lived (the same ward I submitted my removal papers through) was out to dinner with some friends and decided to gossip about me and my decision to remove my name. My uncle just happened to be present at the time and within hours news had reached my parents. My mother was devastated! In her eyes (and according to Mormon doctrine) I would now not be able to live with them in the afterlife, I was no longer sealed to them and she had basically just lost a son. This concept is extremely difficult for non church members to grasp but to say it was devastating to her is an understatement. I immediately called the bishop of the ward and demanded an explanation. This never should have happened. Who was responsible and what consequences would the individual with the big mouth be facing. I wanted justice! This horrible monster that I had tried so hard to distance myself from had snuck back into my life and tried to destroy a very core part of it, the relationship which I had with my parents. I felt violated. Exposed. Furious. I also met with the stake president and demanded explanation! I received none besides stating that they would talk with the individual and that it never should have happened. I left my number and address and asked to be informed of actions taken to correct this, I wanted retribution, not excuses! I was never contacted by either members of the stake or ward clergy. How could they let this man continue to hold his position in the church leadership when he so carelessly divulges confidential information that has the potential to destroy people's lives? How many other people's private, intimate details was he sharing with his friends over dinner? To this day I have never received an apology or correspondence relating to this. With my limited resources I sought civil action. Certainly this would fall under the category of defamation of character? Wasn't their some sort of confidentiality breach that I right to seek action over? I found little help and with my limited time and resources gave up seeking civil action. Not sure if I had a case, but certainly feeling I did.

It has now been almost a year since the incident. And obviously my feelings towards the church, like sauerkraut, become more sour and bitter with time. It's not something I care to dwell on and let affect my life in my current reality. You might ask why on earth would I take the time to write this then? I will tell you why. I was not lucky enough to see this organization for what it really is until after I was neck deep in it. It is ridiculous that people take such a corrupt, power hungry, bigotous, racist cult and wrap it up in a cute little box with a picture of Jesus on the front and some cute ribbons showing the good and service they do in the world. DO NOT BE FOOLED! For those of you who seek support and advice in leaving the church feel free to contact me. I would be more than happy to offer my insight. I also have excellent templates for letters if you would like to have your name removed. My desire is that this helps even if only one person, take the step towards realizing the falseness and leaving the church.

--Rich Barton