I never want to burden you more than you are already burdened and I don't often want to talk about my problems because in knowing them your inclination is always to want to solve them. Today, though I need to let you in because I have been carrying this for too long on my own. I don't want you to solve it or worry about it, I just want you to understand a little.
You know how I like religious books? It's because I see value in religion and at the same time I rail against dogma and legalism and sometimes it feels that religion is shrouded in these two. I look in these religious books for other people's experiences of making it work for them and I also look to them to validate my own feeling... to not feel so alone, but I'm starting to feel like I've exhausted my drive for other people's experiences with religion. I have my own and that has been exhausting enough. I'm also finally at a place where I feel confident in myself and God enough to accept where and what I am.
I love the Church because it is my home. I love the people, I love serving them, I love the spirit in preparing and teaching a lesson, I love the truths that I find in Mormonism, I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but I've been on a long journey with my faith and it has slowly morphed over the past many years and I suppose everyone's faith does this, but the cumulative effect of my slow transition has been a dramatic shift in the way I view the world and God and the Church. Sometimes that causes me a lot of mental anguish.
Most church members feel spiritually strengthened at church. There are many weeks that I do, but church can be emotionally draining and painful to me. I used to view the world as black and white, and everything I would hear at church would confirm my own views nearly 100%. That kind of spiritual validation can be very strengthening. Instead, now when I attend church I find that only about 40-50% of what is taught is validating to me, leading to the opposite, a lot of invalidation and feelings of isolation. The experience is especially acute when I have to teach things that I don't completely believe in. This cognitive dissonance is painful. Some Sundays I feel like I am disingenuous, and representing myself as something that I'm not. Sometimes I am overcome by an overwhelming feeling that I don't belong with these people whom I dearly love.
I don't want to do anything different about this. I don't want to leave. I don't want to stop teaching or serving. I don't want to change anything. I want to continue in the struggle. I want to keep wrestling. I just wanted you to know that I do struggle and it is painful.
And I love you. That is the easiest thing I do.
L
