ICSA TODAY 4
A full tithe (ten percent of one’s gross income) was expected
and was an absolute requirement for entering the temple,
regardless of the financial strain it put on whoever was writing
the check. You may not enter the temple without writing that
check, and LDS doctrine is clear that you cannot enter the
highest degrees of exaltation without the temple. Though
no bank statements were ever collected or scrutinized to
confirm that someone was paying a full tithe, messages were
frequently delivered from the pulpit chastising anyone who
gave less than a full ten percent of their gross income, and
there were frequent implications that this act of disobedience
could lead to punishments from God.
As many who have experienced life in a high-control group
can attest, obedience is difficult to define or measure. One
can always be doing more or else risk not being obedient
enough. I might fulfill a calling I loathed, but if I was not doing
so with the right attitude, or if I was unwilling to sacrifice sleep
for the sake of the calling, or if I was frustrated with all that
was being asked of me, God would not approve, and I would
be subject to reproach by some church authority. I might be
praying regularly, but if I was not praying the right way, or with
the right attitude, or in the right place at the right time, it was
my fault that my prayer would not be answered. There was
always more I could be doing, another way I could be serving,
another selfish desire I had failed to sacrifice for the sake of the
Lord’s work. Such messages were regularly delivered during
Sunday services and from the larger platform of the church’s
general leadership. LDS doctrine states that its leaders have
stronger connections to God, granting them the authority to
speak in his name.
The only way I could absolve myself was to do more and be
obedient.
In my mind, the only way I could absolve myself of the
wrongness that plagued me was to do more and be obedient.
I was perpetually exhausted and stressed but slowing down
was seen as selfish. I was told to pray for strength when I
felt desperate for rest. When I was frustrated with policies or
decisions made and handed down by those in authority, I was
met with confusion and frustration.
My bishop (leader of the local LDS congregation, similar to
a pastor in a Protestant church) expressed concerns about
my rebellious spirit and how I was influenced by worldly
ideas instead of by God’s anointed. Other church members
questioned my devotion when I expressed doubts or
questions. I was even dubbed a dangerous apostate by
one fellow church member after I expressed my insistence
on thinking for myself. Though I laughed aloud at such
comments, inwardly, my self-loathing grew stronger as I
became increasingly frustrated with my inability to do as
I was told and silence my doubts. Surely, I, a woman filled
with a wrongness that made her unlovable and perpetually
depressed, was in no position to question men ordained by
God!
For seven years, I tried to go along with whatever was
necessary to achieve the peace and joy the LDS Church
promised. When the promised joy or blessings did not follow,
I was sure that it was due to the wrongness inside of me
seeping through. My rebellion and inability to bite my tongue
were further proof of how bad and unlovable I was. I tried
everything to compensate, through greater diligence, loyalty,
and obedience, but nothing I did was ever enough. The
wrongness always won.
I completed the checklist. I ticked all the boxes. I was granted
my temple recommend by those in authority over me, and I
hoped the temple would unlock the path to happiness that I
had always seemed blocked from. The temple was supposed
to be the foundation of the church, the most sacred place on
Earth, a place that would bring me as close to God as it was
possible for a living person to be (“Houses of the Lord,” 2010). I
clung to the hope that this closeness would absolve me of my
wrongness.
To my shock and disappointment, I did not enjoy the temple. I
quickly came to hate it. I did not understand how other people
felt such love for it or found peace within its walls. Again, I was
sure it was a failure on my part, as I seemed to be the only one
who felt this way. I visited the temple as frequently as I could,
in hopes of feeling the magic this place was supposed to offer.
Instead, I felt frustrated, confused, and bored. The only relief I
ever experienced in the temple came when I accidentally fell
asleep and took a brief nap.
I had been taught that the temple would be where I would
learn the answers to all of my existential questions, and I
would be able to understand my worth as a child of God
(Hinckley, 2010). I sat in temple services and wondered when
I would get to the part where such learning would take place.
I volunteered to clean the temple after it had closed for the
evening, in hopes I might discover the room I had not yet
been through, where I would gain the answers I was promised.
I never found such a room, or any desperately sought answer,
no matter how many times I attended the temple, or how well
I vacuumed it.
I did not love the temple, and the only reason I could find
for this was that God did not love me. Other people might
have rebellious spirits, or have things wrong with them, but
every other Mormon seemed happy. Every other member
of the LDS Church seemed to find peace in the temple and
to feel uplifted in church, to find answers to prayers and feel
comfort in their souls, as we were promised we would be if
I was told Jesus could make my
sins “white as snow” … and yet,
I felt the wrongness lurking within
me, like a cancer on my soul.

VOLUME 13 |ISSUE 3 |2022 5
we were obedient (Monson, 2013). It seemed I was the only
person who did not. I had joined the church after having been
promised it would give me a place to belong and a connection
to God that would assure me of His love. I was told Jesus could
make my sins “white as snow” (Isa. 1:18) and yet, I felt the
wrongness lurking within me, like a cancer on my soul.
During my seven-year tenure as a devout Latter-Day Saint, I
did all I could to be a good Mormon girl and hide or disguise
the wrongness in me. There was rarely a day that I did not
have something church-related to attend to. I cleaned the
church buildings, held multiple callings, paid a full tithe, gave
up my love of tea, attended the temple, fasted regularly,
signed up for every service project, served homemade
meals to the missionaries, studied scriptures daily, had a
very popular Mormon blog, prayed many times each day,
and, yes, I wore the special Mormon underwear. When I did
not want to do one of these tasks, I was sure it was Satan
attacking me, exploiting the wrongness within me, luring
me to disobey the church and anger God. I would push the
wrongness, Satan, my emotions and doubts aside, as I dove
deeper into my church service. I held fast to the hope that if
I worked harder and were more obedient to church leaders
and commandments, I could finally absolve myself of the
wrongness I felt inside.
LDS policies against LGBTQ+ people made me realize how
much of myself I had hidden
The pressure to tick all the boxes to be deemed worthy and
keep every commandment was immense. I had daily panic
attacks and frequently contemplated leaving the church, but
the promise of a path to being lovable kept me from straying
too far. However, in 2015, the LDS Church announced several
policies that were openly discriminatory against LGBTQ+
people (Weaver, 2015). In addition to being infuriating, these
policies also made me realize that no one would ever be good
enough within the LDS Church. Mormon policies and doctrine
condemned people for who they are and for failing to reach
the unattainable standards set by the LDS Church.
My mind had long convinced me that there was something
wrong with me, but the policies the LDS Church enacted in
2015 began my realization that Mormon doctrine and culture
were designed to cast all but an extremely select group of
(cisgendered, heterosexual, male) people as fundamentally
inadequate. The LDS Church has long taught that sex is only
acceptable between a married couple. However, the 2015
policies made marriage between people of the same gender a
sin worthy of excommunication. D. Todd Christofferson, of the
Quorum of the Twelve Apostles within the LDS Church (one
of the highest positions in the entire church), called same-sex
marriages “wrong” and a “serious kind of sin” (Weaver, 2015).
Anyone who was in a same-sex relationship would be barred
from the temple, serving in a calling, or participating in sacred
ordinances (Weaver, 2015). I was appalled at the thought that
a gay person would be told they and their children had no
path to God, and no place within the LDS Church, unless they
renounced the most fundamental parts of themselves. This
was completely in contradiction to what I believed about God,
love, and humanity. This was not a path to God I wanted to be
on.
In recognizing the hypocrisy and discrimination the LDS
Church was showing towards LGBTQ+ people, I realized how
much of myself I had hidden since joining the church. I had
forced myself to keep quiet about things I felt were wrong, and
my self-loathing had intensified as I struggled to quiet doubts
and questions that were not acceptable within the LDS Church
or its culture. I still felt the wrongness within me, but I was
finally ready to stop trying to purge it from myself. Perhaps I
was perpetually unlovable, but I was willing to accept this if
doing so allowed me to have my life and my mind back within
my own control.
I came to understand the wrongness I felt through a
psychotherapy training about scrupulosity OCD
I had attained my master’s degree in social work while still an
active member of the LDS Church. I joked that I had chosen
this career because it allowed me to help people for a living.
In truth, I had hoped that having a career helping others
would allow me to further hide the terribleness within me. It
took me a long time, and a lot of psychotherapy, to process
all that led me to join the LDS Church, remain for so long, and
eventually leave. I had been labeled as anxious since I was
a young child, but it was only as I attended psychotherapy
that I truly understood what this meant and how it had
affected my life. I recognized how my anxiety had manifested
in self-loathing, and this had led to my belief that there was
something fundamentally wrong with me that caused me to
be unlovable. This new understanding led me to reconsider
nearly every aspect of my relationship to the world around
me. It was an overwhelming, terrifying, and beautifully freeing
process.
My passion for helping others continued, but I found different
ways of channeling this passion that best suited me. I wanted
to help others struggling to find peace within their own
minds. I pursued my clinical social work licensure and pursued
further education to become a psychotherapist myself.
I was appalled at the thought that a
gay person would be told they and their
children had … no place within the LDS
Church, unless they renounced the most
fundamental parts of themselves. …This
was not a path to God I wanted to be on.