Seattle Ute

[Indy Coug]

Originally Posted by El Paso Coug

You have a very practical approach, which I try to have as well. Your approach is to extract the good from any situation and leave the bad. I think that it would be very hard for someone to say that there isn't an enormous amount of good things relating to the LDS Church, regardless of whether you are a believer or not. It's hard to argue that the LDS Church won't make an individual a better human being and doesn't teach excellent life principles.

I think that the bitterness comes from "the only true church" claim. If you are taught to believe that the LDS Church is the only true church, that it's the only place where God's true authority is found and that God can only give revelation to the LDS prophet and then the Church makes you swear your life to the Church when you are 19, I can see where someone would be bitter if you determined that those extremely serious claims regarding salvation were false. It would be hard to simply walk away from that and just say, "well, it's not true and I'll go find another religion now", when you have lived your life thinking you were following the only true path to the celestial kingdom. The fact that you lived a productive and wholesome life and were taught some really good principles along the way is great, but it doesn't change the gravity of the discovery regarding true salvation.

If I were to disavow myself of the LDS church, I would essentially conclude that there is no higher power. As a result, I wouldn't worry about the path to salvation because I would conclude that there is none.

Conceivably there might be some subsequent bitterness that my existence is nothing more than mortality and hence is rendered somewhat meaningless, but my bitterness, if I was being honest with myself, wouldn't be misdirected at the LDS church.